MIGRATION ON THE COAST. 285 



during the night, and thus escape observation ; 

 many others, it may be, pass to inland haunts by 

 day, but without alighting upon the coast at all, 

 flying at altitudes which render their identification, 

 or even detection, impossible ; but then there are 

 many more, and especially in autumn, when the 

 flight is generally far more leisurely than in spring, 

 which crowd upon the coasts, or pass along them, 

 within easy view of the most casual scrutiny. It 

 may here, perhaps, be advisable to allude to the 

 general order in which migrants usually appear 

 upon the coast. Of course, it is utterly impossible, 

 within the narrow limits of the present chapter, to 

 enter very minutely into the many and intricate 

 phenomena connected with the migration of birds. 

 The reader anxious for further and more detailed 

 information on this very interesting subject, may be 

 referred to the present writer's works upon Migra- 

 tion, and to that on the birds of Heligoland, by 

 Herr Gatke.* Now, as regards the actual order of 

 appearance. In spring, the observer will almost 

 invariably find that the adult males are in the van ; 

 the females are the next to arrive, whilst the young 

 of the preceding summer, and the more or less 

 weakly individuals, bring up the rear. Many of 

 these young and sickly birds pass the summer far 

 south of the usual breeding-grounds ; so that it is 

 by no means an uncommon thing to find individuals 



* The Migration of Birds; The Migration of British Birds j 

 Heligoland an Ornithological Observatory . 



