AMONG THE BIRDS IN AUTUMN. 179 



generally leave us a week or more before their 

 parents. 



Changes rapid and continuous are also taking 

 place among the birds of the coast. At all the 

 summer stations of the sea-birds, as soon as the 

 young can fly, a grand breaking-up takes place. 

 The long winter vacation has commenced, and the 

 birds of these rocks, and islets, and cliffs disperse 

 over the surrounding sea, many species, such as 

 the Terns, going southwards to the tropics. The Te s 



* O O moving 



low, flat mud -banks and salt marshes of the 

 eastern counties, which in summer were almost 

 deserted by birds, now become thronged with 

 feathered visitors from all parts of the north. One 

 of the first birds to make its appearance on these 

 mud-flats is the Knot. At the close of summer 



arrive during 



the young birds arrived ; now in the early autumn fndoaober. 

 days the old birds, having moulted into their gray 

 winter plumage ere leaving the high north where 

 they have bred, arrive in thousands. Many of 

 them linger on these muds all the winter, but the 

 greater number work slowly southwards to the 

 west coast of Africa. Dunlins in countless hordes 

 rest on these muds, and may often be seen in 

 compact flocks, wheeling and turning with mar- 

 vellous precision just above the shallow water or 

 the wet shining beach. Another bird which comes 

 a little later on in autumn to these places is the 

 Hooded Crow. This bird is a visitor from Northern Hooded 



Crow 



Europe, and picks up a rich living on the coasts oaober. I2lh 

 and adjoining meadows, often following the course 



N 2 



