110 



northern countries, no doubt, supported an abundant and resident 

 avian population. Opinions, however, differ as to the duration of 

 daylight which prevailed so far north during the winter months. 

 Some hold that simultaneous with a temperate climate there 

 existed a proportionate amount throughout the year. Others, 

 again, think that the duration of the latter was no greater than at 

 the present time. In the opinion of the late Henry Seebohm, the 

 Polar Basin was the ancestral home of the great family of the 

 Charadriidae, and the earliest members of this group performed 

 their first migration, not in search of food alone, but in quest 

 also of light. 



It will not be necessary to speculate on the latter probability, 

 though this additional reason for migration should be by no 

 means ignored. It will be profitable, however, to examine the 

 daily lives of certain sedentary species of birds in our own 

 country at the present day, for it is not unreasonable to suppose 

 that their habits correspond to those formerly living in the Arctic 

 regions at the time the latter enjoyed a temperate climate. There 

 seems to have been innate at all times in birds, with the excep- 

 tion of a few species, a passionate love for particular localities, 

 not only in the selection of nesting sites, but also for familiar 

 winter haunts and roosting places. Professor Newton, in his 

 " Dictionary of Birds " recounts some interesting cases illustrating 

 this strength of attachment to the former. The most remarkable 

 instance to which he refers is, undoubtedly, the return of a pair 

 of Stone Curlews a bird of heaths and open countries to a 

 nesting site which had become the centre of a plantation. To 

 these favoured localities the same birds, or their offspring, return 

 year after year, either to nest or to spend the winter. 



The early arrival in Great Britain of the Chiff- Chaff and 

 Wheatear is typical of this strong desire on their part, to return 

 to their breeding homes. The latter has on two occasions been 

 known to reach the south-west of England as early as February 

 (vide " Migration Eeports ") and the former regularly arrives by 

 the middle of March. Nidification in either case not commencing 

 until six weeks later. Further evidence to the same effect may 

 be gleaned from the movements of Skylarks, Starlings, &c., at 

 Heligoland (p. 5). 



