MIGRATION HIGHWAYS 427 



sionally, however, a bird, or a small party of birds which 

 ought to take the eastern route accidentally get wrong,, 

 take the western turning and find their way into Europe, 

 where some of them are caught, and are justly considered 

 as great rarities. Most of these little blunderers who 

 have taken the wrong road are birds of the year, who, 

 never having migrated before, have not yet learnt their 

 right way, and may be excused for having gone 

 wrong. 



The facts of migration, as observed from an insular 

 point of view, lead to theories which will not hold water 

 when we come to compare them with observations made 

 on a great continent. It must be conceded that birds 

 have certain recognised routes or highways of migration, 

 which they follow with remarkable pertinacity. But 

 different species of birds have in many cases different 

 routes. Some of these routes have been mapped out by 

 Palmen, Middendorff, and Severtzoff, but it would be a 

 great mistake to suppose that all birds migrating from 

 any given locality choose the same route. These high- 

 ways are complicated, and the route chosen by one 

 species of birds often crosses at right angles that selected 

 by another species. In Cordeaux ; s interesting book on 

 the birds of the H umber district, many interesting facts 

 connected with this subject are given. 



The subject of migration is one which is receiving 

 much more systematic attention than has ever been given 

 to it before. For some years printed forms with schedules 

 of instructions connected with migration have been for- 

 warded to more than a hundred and fifty lighthouse stations 

 on the coasts of England and Scotland by two gentlemen 

 interested in this branch of the study of ornithology- 

 Mr. J. A. Harvie- Brown (my companion on the trip to the 

 valley of the Petchora) and Mr. John Cordeaux. The 



