WILLOW-WREN. 431 



and Dresser's statement that it is generally distributed there in summer is 

 no doubt an error^ as Goebel in South-west Russia^ Bogdanow in the 

 Caucasus, and Hencke at Astrakhan all agree that it is only seen on the 

 spring and autumn migrations. Danford and Harvie-Brown found it 

 breeding in Transylvania ; but in Turkey, Greece, Asia Minor, and Pales- 

 tine it is only found in winter. The Siberian birds appear to migrate west 

 in autumn, as the Willow-Wren has not been found in Turkestan, though 

 a few appear to winter in Persia. A few winter in Spain and Sicily; but 

 the great winter quarters of this bird are in Africa. It abounds in the 

 oases of the desert, is very common in the valley of the Nile, and has been 

 sent in collections from the Gambia river, Senegal, the Congo, Damara 

 Land, the Cape, Natal, and the Transvaal. From the latter country I 

 have examples in full spring moult. 



The Willow- Wren is one of the earliest birds in spring to migrate. In 

 the south of England, as in North Germany, it arrives towards the end of 

 March, in Yorkshire during the first week of April, and in the middle parts 

 of Scotland (according to Macgillivray) about the 30th or 25th of April. 

 In the valley of the Petchora, in lat. 65°, we first heard its notes on the 

 20th of May ; and on the Arctic circle in the valley of the Yenesay it did 

 not arrive until the 4tli of June. It leaves this country in September. 

 In the last week of that month I observed great numbers on Heligoland ; 

 andGaetke tells us that it frequently appears on that island in considerable 

 numbers as early as the middle of August. 



The Willow-W ren is such a common bird that it is difficult to say where 

 it is not to be found. Its cheerful song may be heard in the copses of our 

 wildest moorlands, or on the few trees that struggle for existence among 

 the rocks and peat on the banks of the mountain-becks, amongst the furze- 

 bushes on the common, in plantations and woods of all kinds of trees, in 

 the farm as well as the garden, and even amongst the trees and shrubs in 

 front of the villas almost in the middle of our blackest towns. 



The Willow- Wren is especially common in the neighbourhood of Shef- 

 field. All the world knows what a black place Sheffield is. The ill-thriven 

 village that forged the penblade wherewith Chaucer whittled his crow- 

 quill was proverbial for its blackness ; and tradition shows us in legendary 

 perspective the tilts on the banks of the Don where the Brigantine warriors 

 took their arrows to be steeled by the half-savage sons of Vulcan — the green 

 meadows by the ri\'cr-side scarred by their coal-pits, and the grand old 

 oaks and silvery birches on the mountain-slope charred by the smoke of 

 their rude forges. The huge armour-plate rolling-mills have brought the 

 town to its climax of blackness. Passengers by the express from the em- 

 porium of gold to Cottonopolis shrug their shoulders as they neai- the 

 Victoria Station, and fancy they have reached the zero of physical as well 

 as of moral good. The view over the Wicker is indeed a dismal one. 



