OCTOBER 199 



which is only interrupted by the contingency of a 

 severe frost. 



This settling into winter quarters involves, even in 

 the case of our common resident birds, a large amount 

 of movement about the country and change of haunt. 

 It may be no more than a change from the woods to 

 the lanes, as in the case of the Bullfinches which now 

 leave the plantations and appear in the hedge-rows, 

 their presence made known by a glimpse of white 

 rumps disappearing into a thicket and by the low 

 piping call-note which the bird-catcher can imitate 

 so well. 



The Golden Plover have left the moors to appear 

 on sand-bars and tidal fiats, and the blue-backed 

 Merlin, which nested near them amongst the heather- 

 knolls, also seeks the coast where it picks up many a 

 wheatear or rock-pipit. The Sparrow-hawk, too, 

 glides with straight and noiseless flight along the 

 cliff-slope on the look-out for similar game. It is 

 sometimes chevied and scolded by half-a-dozen wag- 

 tails, just as, earlier on, the swallow's sharp " feet-a- 

 feet " never fails to raise the alarm when the enemy is 

 about. Chaffinches and Linnets now flock upon the 

 stubbles and weedy fallows. The cock chaffinches 

 seem slow to join these gatherings, wishing perhaps to 

 enjoy a longer spell of freedom, at any rate so large 

 a proportion of the flocks consists of hen-birds and 

 young of the year as to have led Linnaeus to apply the 



