MIGRATION. 157 



swallow. The swallow is not, however, our 

 first spring visitor. The wheatear, the redstart, 

 and some others, precede the swallow ; but as 

 they come not in vast flocks, their arrival 

 attracts but little notice. But wherefore do 

 they come? Surely in the southern climes, 

 where they take up their winter abode, summer 

 would afford them all that they might need. 

 We may think so, but the God of nature has 

 ordered it otherwise. To our latitudes instinct 

 impels a concourse of summer visitors, as if to 

 make up for the loss of those who have left us 

 for the Arctic regions — " Yea, the stork in the 

 heaven knoweth her appointed times ; and the 

 turtle and the crane and the swallow observe 

 the time of their coming," Jer. viii. 7. 



It is not here our purpose to enter into a long 

 detail respecting those species of birds which 

 visit us in winter, and depart northwards in 

 early spring, ere the snowdrop rears her head ; 

 nor yet shall we cite every species which pays 

 us a summer visit, and departs wending its way 

 southwards in autumn. It is to the great prin- 

 ciple by which, unknown even to themselves, 

 they are guided — to an instinctive and a myste- 

 rious impulse, that we would call attention. 

 In the consideration of this subject, the law of 

 God is manifest ; for we cannot suppose that 

 the bird reasons as man Avould do were ho 

 about to journey to other lands, whether for a 

 temporary visit or for a lifetime. It cannot 

 be doubted that birds of regular migration are, 

 unknown to themselves, directed to avoid two 



