JUNE 127 



greatly different in hue and arrangement from that of 

 the cock sparrow not the disreputable dingy London 

 individual, but such as may be seen in any country 

 farmyard. The bunting's back, however, is of a brighter 

 brown, his jetty cap is more jauntily worn, and the 

 brilliance of his white breast and collar give him a far 

 more dressy appearance than the cockiest sparrow that 

 ever hopped. Add to this the grace and agility of his 

 movements, and you have a bird that seems born to 

 the purple, though by some accident nothing more 

 vivid than russet, black and white, has been served out 

 to him. 



Late in these delicious evenings may be heard the 

 nightjar latest of our summer migrants to arrive 

 and earliest to depart reeling off his strange cry 

 like a wooden rattle. No bird has suffered more 

 unjustly than this one from a variety of libellous 

 names. Closely crepuscular in habits, its uncanny 

 looks brought suspicion on it while the world was 

 yet very young. Thus Pliny gravely dubbed it 

 Caprimulgus, Aristotle Aigothelas, terms which we 

 have closely translated 'goatsucker,' thus indorsing 

 the ridiculous idea that it sucks the milk of cows 

 and goats, arising from its custom of pursuing winged 

 insects under the bellies of cattle. Then the titles of 

 fern-owl and night-hawk brought it into the game- 

 keeper's Index expurgatorius as vermin, though 

 another of its popular names, dor-hawk the scourge 

 of dors or beetles ought to have sufficed to protect 

 it. Thousands of these beautiful and useful birds 



