io8 ANIMAL ARTISANS 



of Formosa. In Great Britain their main home is in 

 the woods of Sutherlandshire, while others have dwelt 

 for centuries in the remains of the great Caledonian 

 forest near Rothiemurchus. 



But at all times the crossbills are the very gipsies 

 of the bird world, ready at any moment to wander 

 into the most distant lands, where their strange forms 

 and unfamiliar plumage are at once the object of 

 comment and chronicle. Matthew Paris recorded an 

 invasion of birds with red plumage and beaks like 

 forceps, beaks which they used to cut apples in two 

 and eat the pips; and in the early autumn of 1822, 

 1825, and 1826 they appeared in flocks, like red and 

 green parrots, in Denmark, Holland, and France. In 

 one of these gipsy movements made recently the cross- 

 bills seem to have come to the South of England, 

 and there to have discovered certain places in which 

 they propose to stop. One of these is the Royal 

 Forest of Parkhurst in the Isle of Wight, a wood 

 largely planted with Scotch firs. The other is the 

 great pine-wood of Bournemouth. 



Their presence among the Bournemouth woods was 

 recorded some ten years ago in the Spectator ; and there 

 is little doubt that though their quiet movements, the 

 height of the pines, and the peculiar adaptation of 

 their plumage, brilliant as it is, to the reds and greens 

 of pine shoots and leaves, have caused them to escape 

 the notice of the residents there, their numbers have 

 continued to increase. From the Bournemouth cliffs 

 to the Isle of Wight and Parkhurst Forest is a natural 

 autumn excursion for the birds, and in the latter they 



