FEBKUARY 47 



the Macgregors — 'the clan that is nameless by day' — 

 and many scores of them have found their way lately to 

 the bird stuffers of Inverness. There is no such dis- 

 appointing booty to the taxidermist. The glory of the 

 crossbill's carmine hood and mantle is almost as transient 

 as that of ' Sharon's dewy rose,' fading after death to a 

 dull greenish olive. 



If the daily normal output of energy from the diminu- 

 tive carcase of the goldcrest astonishes us, as well it 

 may, much more amazing is the sustained effort of 

 migration twice a year over thousands of miles ; the more 

 so because the wings of this pigmy appear very ill adapted 

 for long flight. In masters of wingmanship, such as the 

 falcon and the swift, the wing is long and pointed, 

 the second pen-feather being the longest; but in the 

 goldcrest the spread of wing is not equal to that of a 

 well - grown death's - head moth, the wing itself being 

 rounded, with the fifth pen-feather longer than the first 

 four. This serves well enough for the creature to flit 

 from bough to bough, as we are accustomed to see it, 

 but it bafiles all understanding to explain how this 

 mechanism enables the goldcrest to take his part in 

 the strange drama enacted every spring and autumn in 

 Heligoland, the immemorial resting-place of birds of 

 passage. Herr Gatke, that splendid islander who, for 

 more than fifty years, took careful note — ay, and heavy 

 toll too — of the passing flocks, has well described the 

 arrival of the goldcrest — goldhdhnchen, little gold hen 

 as they have it in German. 



'Their migration is performed with perfect regularity year 

 after year, and conducts them not only in hundreds, but at 

 times in many hundreds of thousands, in one night to this 



