58 WILD BIRDS 



Several special trains were running past Micheldever 

 about that time ; and there is nothing like sound, 

 unless it be the sexual fervour of early spring, to 

 impassion singing birds and urge them to fresh 

 effort. 



The clock of bird song is constantly altering 

 with the altering seasons, but it really does afford a 

 sort of timepiece to those who care to follow it with 

 nicety. Thus, as the last song-thrush notes on a 

 rapt July evening early in the month tell me it is 

 nine or five past exceptionally ten past so the 

 first lark notes on an early June morning tell me 

 it is just about two o'clock. These are the only 

 two birds that I have timed in June and July 

 exactly, but Major Arundel sent me from High 

 Ackworth, in Yorkshire, a bird time-table for a night 

 and early morning in June. 



ii p.m., landrail; 11.12 p.m., sedge warbler; 

 12. 10 a.m., grasshopper warbler ; 12.45 a.m., nightin- 

 gale ; 2.5 a.m., skylark ; 2.25 a.m., whinchat (five 

 or six whinchats heard before a note of the song 

 thrush) ; 2.30 a.m., song-thrush ; 2.35 a.m., black- 

 bird and cuckoo ; 2.40 a.m., redbreast ; 2.55 a.m., 

 hedge sparrow and yellow bunting ; 3 a.m., white- 

 throat ; 3.2 a.m., swallow ; 3.5 a.m., tree pipit ; 

 3.15 a.m., pheasant ; 3.20 a.m., willow wren ; 

 3.25 a.m., chaffinch ; 3.27 a.m., rook ; 3.33 a.m., 

 greenfinch ; 3.40 a.m., turtle dove ; 4.7 a.m., martin. 



Some of these entries would be of no use in con- 

 triving our bird clock. The nightingale's song does 

 not give the smallest hint as to what o'clock it is ; 



