gS The White-throat. 



most remarkable properties of birds is, that facility by which 

 they so regularly disperse themselves over the whole country on 

 their arrival after their far migration, each one, in all probability, 

 attracted by some attachment of the past, stopping short at, or 

 proceeding onward to, the exact spot where he himself first 

 came into the consciousness of life. This is one of the wonder- 

 ful arrangements of nature, otherwise of God, by which the great 

 balance is so beautifully kept in creation. If the migratory bird 

 arrives ever so weary at Dover, and its true home be some 

 sweet low-lying lane of Devonshire, a thick hedgerow of the 

 midland counties, or a thickety glen of Westmoreland, it will 

 not delay its flight nor be tempted to tarry short of that glen, 

 hedgerow, or lane with which the experience of its own life and 

 affection is united. 



At this charming time of the year none of the various per- 

 formers in nature's great concert bring back to those who have 

 passed their youth in the country a more delicious recollection 

 of vernal fields and lanes than this bird of ours, the little white- 

 throat. 



Yes, along those hedges, fresh and fragrant with their young 

 leaves, along those banks studded with primroses, campions, 

 blue-bells and white starwort, and through the thick growth 

 of the wild-rose bushes, all of which have a beauty especially 

 their own, the white-throat salutes you as you pass, as if to re- 

 cognise an old acquaintance. He is brimful of fun ; out he 

 starts and performs his series of eccentric frolics in the air, 

 accompanied by his mad-cap sort of warble ; or, almost as if 

 laughing at you, he repeats from the interior of the bushes his 

 deep grave note, chaw ! chaw ! whence comes the name of 



