they congregate and fly round and round in great circles, at a 
considerable height. Small wading-birds, like ringed plovers 
and dunlin, commonly fly in ‘‘ bunches.” The last named 
furnish a singularly interesting sight when thus travelling ; 
for their evolutions are so amazingly timed. As if at a given 
signal every bird in the troop will change its course at the 
same moment, and in the same direction, so that now one 
sees a flickering mesh-work of grey, and now a shimmering 
as of snow-flakes, as first the grey backs, and then the white 
breasts are turned towards one. But flights such as this 
are to be seen only during the autumn and winter months. 
For during the breeding season these little flocks are broken 
up and distributed far and wide. But there is yet another 
reason. They wear a totally different dress—the courtship 
or breeding plumage. Herein the upper parts are of a rich 
chestnut hue, streaked with black, while the under parts are 
black. Even more fascinating to watch are the autumn 
troops of starlings on the way to their roosting places. 
Hundreds at a time, not to say thousands, take part in these 
flights. Now they rush onward, in one great far-flung sheet, 
and now they close up into a great, almost ball-like, mass : 
and now they thin out till they look like a trail of smoke. 
But always they wheel and turn and rise and descend, not 
as separate bodies, but as one. How are such wonderful 
evolutions timed. The movements of an army on review- 
184 
