AMERICAN RED-BREASTED THRUSH IN ENGLAND. — 15 
on a wet windy day during the previous month of April (or May, 
he was not sure which), and perching upon the first resting-place 
which presented itself, the balcony of a house facing the sea at 
Dover, had suffered itself to be frightened in through an open 
window and eventually caught. It lived in a small wicker-cage 
from April until September, when I first heard of it, and although 
the plumage became much soiled by confinement, it remained in 
good health. 
From a description and sketch which Lieut. Pope forwarded, 
I had no doubt from the first that the bird was the North American 
Red-breasted Thrush, but it was not until two months later that 
I was enabled to pronounce with certainty upon the species. Being 
unable to refer to any of the works on American Ornithology to 
which I had referred him, Lieut. Pope prevailed upon his friend 
to forward the bird to me in London, and I duly received it on the 
6th November last. My surmise was correct: it was undoubtedly 
Turdus migratorius. i 
With the Secretary’s permission, I at once placed it in the 
Western Aviary in the Zoological Society’s Gardens, where it may 
still be seen in good health, and in much improved plumage. 
Now, how did this bird get to Dover? On my mentioning the 
circumstances of its capture to Mr. A. D. Bartlett, whose long 
experience as Superintendent of the Zoological Society’s Gardens 
gives weight to his opinion in such matters, he was inclined to 
believe that it had escaped from some homeward-bound vessel in 
the Channel, and had made for the nearest land; a view which he 
thought was strengthened by the fact that the bird when he 
received it was very tame. 
Tn this I do not quite concur, for I imagine that most homeward- 
bound vessels from New York return to Liverpool, and not vid 
‘Dover; while the bird’s tameness is easily accounted for by the 
fact that when Mr. Bartlett received it into his care it had already 
been in captivity for about six months. I am thus disposed to 
regard this as a genuine case of involuntary immigration. 
Many such cases are already on record, and although this 
particular species is not known with certainty to have occurred 
here before, it has been met with on more than one occasion on 
the European continent, and, from its migratory habits, is just one 
of those birds which one would naturally expect now and then to 
arrive. 
