52 WOODLANDERS AND FIELD FOLK 



III 



THE WHITE-THROATS 



THE white-throat is still another of our summer 

 visitants, and perhaps the commonest of all. This 

 white-throated warbler comes to the " Domain " in 

 April or early May, and stays until the closing days 

 of September sometimes even until it is driven 

 away by the bleak blasts of October. Frail things 

 these warblers are for the most part, and conducting 

 their migrations by no means as is generally sup- 

 posed. When trees are bare and the wind howls 

 through the dripping woods when insect life as- 

 sumes the larval stage and winged things are scarce 

 these are the signs that the birds must be gone. But 

 instead, as is generally supposed, of rising on buoyant 

 wing and steering straight for coast-line and sea, 

 these delicate creatures creep from bush to bush, 

 seeking the thickest shelter, and thus, by a slow and 

 devious route, they reach the coasts, flitting along 

 and crossing always at the narrowest part, or along 

 the hidden line of some submerged and long-lost 

 isthmus. 



In spring, when the white-throats arrive, they 

 search out their haunts along the margins of woods, 

 by lane hedgerows, by gardens, copses and thickets. 

 Bypaths they love those old, seldom trodden 



