292 INSECTI VOILE. 



the dry, but not the most barren moors, being found only 

 where there are thick brakes of furze, or other close bushes 

 which do not rise high above the surface, but are close, and 

 afford concealment to the nests, and also to the birds them- 

 selves, who reside there, and find a warm and sheltered habi- 

 tation, and in all probability food, when the ground is 

 covered and the sheltering bush nearly buried with snow. 



A furze bush on a wide moor, over which the winds 

 sweep with unbroken fury, is a sort of menagerie in the 

 desert; it catches and retains all the lighter mould which 

 the wind drives, together with seeds of plants and larvse of 

 insects ; and though furze does not grow where water stag- 

 nates, breeds mosses, and converts into peat even the matters 

 which the wind drives, yet there is always some moisture 

 under its close shade, so that there are worms there, and all 

 sorts of crawling and creeping things of the wild; and, as is 

 also the case with the snails and slugs under hedges in the 

 cultivated lands, they do not require to make their winter 

 habitations deep below the surface under the furze. Thus, 

 though the stone -chat is a smaller bird, and feeds upon 

 smaller prey, it feeds much in the same manner as the thrush 

 and the blackbird, and does not, unless the winter is very 

 severe, need to shift into other grounds. This bird is, 

 indeed, most truly and characteristically the " whin" chat, as 

 it summers and winters among whins, though the name is 

 appropriated to a migratory species, which does not so exclu- 

 sively inhabit bushes even in the summer. The young are 

 indeed, said to " go on their travels" the first year, and not to 

 acquire that fondness for the place of their residence which 

 characterizes the species, till they have had a nest and a 

 family of their own ; but as they are not seen on the low 

 grounds, except in very prolonged severe weather, and as they 

 live apart at all times, the autumnal dispersion of the young 

 may be nothing more than a local distribution over the 



