RING OUZEL. 219 



THE RING OUZEL is a summer visitor to the British 

 Islands ; and although its migrations are decidedly opposite 

 as to season to those of the Fieldfare and Redwing, which 

 visit us in winter, all three pass the coldest weather in the 

 warmer parts of Europe, and the countries a little farther 

 to the south of it, and all three likewise pass the summer in 

 the more central or northern parts. 



The Ring Ouzel arrives in this country from the south in 

 the month of April, and appears to prefer the extreme 

 western and northern portions of these islands, visiting the 

 wilder rocky and mountainous districts generally. They 

 breed, it is said, on Dartmoor every year ; and Mr. Eyton 

 has noticed that they are by no means rare birds in Wales, 

 particularly on the Berwyn chain of mountains near Corwen. 

 According to Mr. Thompson,* they are distributed generally 

 over Ireland ; and the birds are seen every spring in Devon- 

 shire and Cornwall, on their passage, probably, to these 

 breedi ng-grounds . 



They are seen in Surrey, Kent, Essex, Suffolk, and Nor- 

 folk, both in spring and autumn ; and from the circumstance 

 of a specimen having been shot early in the month of 

 August 1836 near Saffron Wai den, it was conjectured the 

 bird had been bred in that neighbourhood. In 1804, a pair 

 built in a garden at Lowestoff ; but their nests are much 

 more frequent in the northern counties. Mr. Allis of York 

 tells me that it breeds in the higher moorlands of York- 

 shire : and the eggs of this bird in my own collection were 

 sent me by Mr. Leyland of Halifax. They are known to 

 breed also in Derbyshire. Mr. Selby, in his Catalogue of 

 Birds of the county of Northumberland, says it is common 

 in summer throughout the Cheviot range, and the higher 

 parts of Cumberland and Durham. At the meeting of the 



* Mag. of Zool. and Bot. vol. ii. p. 438. 



