igS WITHOUT LOSING THE WAY 



sets in. Therefore I opine that neither 

 swallows nor any other bird of a temperate 

 chme suffers from cold, but starvation soon 

 puts an end to them. 



Birds of certain species migrate in enormous 

 companies which take days in passing ; others 

 travel in comparatively small lots ; some- 

 times a mere handful is seen, and even single 

 individuals make their way over a trackless 

 sea. But none of these fly at random ; singly 

 or in groups, they are psychologically con- 

 nected up with their respective stations and 

 travel without thought of losing their way ; a 

 constant danger, however, is an adverse gale 

 of wind. When this happens the birds are 

 either beaten down and drowned, or forcibly 

 driven hundreds of miles out of their course, 

 when they turn up in regions quite outside of 

 their natural hmits. The occurrence of rare 

 birds under these circumstances does not, of 

 course, entitle the visitants to be claimed as 

 indigenous to the countries in which they are 

 identified and recorded. For instance, the 

 Sand-Grouse (Syrraptes paradoxus), periodi- 

 cally noted in Great Britain, is not, and never 

 was, a British species. 



However much encouraged and protected, 

 this bird does not remain permanently ; and 

 the same applies to many others. For this 



