Migi'ation. 265 



me whether these birds are companions, in a sense, 

 of the nightingale, having noticed them in other 

 places to be much together. All spring and summer 

 the hedges, coppices, brakes, thickets, furze lands, 

 and cornfields, abounded with bird life. About the 

 middle of August there was a notable decrease. 

 Early in September the places previously so populous 

 seemed almost deserted ; by the middle of the month 

 quite deserted. 



There were no chaffinches in the elms or in the 

 road, and scarcely a sparrow ; not a yellow-hammer 

 on the hedge by the cornfield ; only a ver}^ few green- 

 finches ; not a single bullfinch or goldfinch. Black- 

 birds, thrushes, and robins alone remained. The way 

 to find what birds are about is to watch one of their 

 favorite drinking and bathing places ; then it is easy 

 to see which are absent. Where had all these birds 

 gone to? In the middle of the field of stubble there 

 were flocks of sparrows — almost innumerable spar- 

 rows — and some finches, but not, apparently, enough 

 to account for all that had left the hedges and trees. 

 That ma}' be explained by their being scattered over 

 so many broad acres — miles of arable land being 

 open to them. 



But the migration from the hedgerows was very 

 marked. They became quite empty and silent about 

 the middle of September. This state of things con- 

 tinued for httle more than a week — meaning the 

 absolute silence — then a bird or two appeared in 

 places at long intervals. They now came back 

 rapidly, till, on the 28th, the ' fink, chink ' of the 

 finches sounded almost as merrily as before. The 

 greenfinches flew from tree to tree in parties of four, 



