Birds. 2225 



linger a few days on Kendal Fell, on their way to more elevated and distant breeding- 

 grounds. In some habitats the dunlin is a constant summer companion of the golden 

 plover. The dalesmen call this little Tringa a 'jack plover;' but on the coast, where 

 large flocks are found throughout winter, its altered plumage transforms it into the 

 fisherman's ' sand-mouse.' Numbers of these ' sand-mice ' are taken in the flook-nets, 

 and are exposed for sale in our fish-market, along with oyster-catchers, scoters and 

 scaup ducks, for several weeks in the depth of winter. Our first regular migrator is 

 the wheatear, its arrival being rarely earlier than the 29th of March, and seldom latei 

 than the 3rd of April : stone fences and the rocky parts of high inclosures are its 

 favourite haunts, and in these places it appears three or four days earlier than in the 

 valley. During the cold easterly winds, accompanied with hail or snow, which occa- 

 sionally prevail about the middle of April, I have known wheatears assemble in large 

 flocks : they select a sheltered inclosure, and remain, not on the most harmonious 

 terms with each other, till more genial weather invites them to disband and scatter 

 again in pairs over the country. The ring ouzel was nearly a week earlier than usual : 

 this species abounds on most of our " fells," building in low bushes, or among the 

 rough banks of deep water-courses. This bird becomes very docile in confinement ; 

 one in my possession, reared from the nest, far apart from its congeners, proved to be 

 a male bird ; and on the following spring whistled correctly and freely the wild notes 

 of its species. The willow warbler was also a few days earlier than in ordinary sea- 

 sons, the 16th of April being its usual time. For many years I have observed the fact, 

 mentioned by Mr. Selby, of this warbler's arrival coinciding with the leafing of larch 

 plantations. In the early spring of 1846 this harmony between the two was disturbed ; 

 for the larch was in leaf, in sheltered places, as early as the 5th of March, and by the 

 middle of that month most of the larch plantations were fully in leaf; but the willow 

 warbler was not with us till the 12th of April. The redstart is an abundant species 

 both in town and country, pouring forth its sprightly song from the top of a chimney 

 or arm of a weathercock. In 1846 I heard its note as early as the 13th of April, the 

 18th being its usual time. This species arrives about three days sooner in low than 

 in high situations : an old garden-wall is preferred as a nesting-place. From the 15th 

 to the 20th of April, the tree titling arrives, — a plentiful species in most of our culti- 

 vated inclosures, particularly such as have the fences tolerably stocked with trees. 

 The 19th of April is an early date for the cuckoo : this observation was taken among 

 the hills, in a range where this well-known cry is first heard. In another mountainous 

 situation we have it noted ten days later; and in the valley our utmost vigilance never 

 welcomed the arrival till the 3rd of May. In 1846, the cuckoo was among the fells 

 still earlier, April 14th ; but we failed to hear it in the lowlands before the 1st of May. 

 The sand martin was late, the 13th of April being the average date of its arrival. 

 The present year furnishes the only instance in which I have known the swallow pre- 

 cede the sand martin. This species, without any apparent cause, is becoming annually 

 scarcer, and appearing later in the district. The swallow generally arrives about the 

 18th of April ; in some years as late as the 23rd. I have no previous record so early 

 as the 12th. Not unfrequently, if a few cold wet days set in soon after its arrival, 

 every swallow seems to have forsaken the neighbourhood. This fact arrested the at- 

 tention of White of Selborne, and he considered the circumstance " much more in 

 favour of hiding than migration ; since it is much more probable that a bird should 

 retire to its hybernaculum just at hand, than return for a week or two only to warmer 

 latitudes." The following fact, which came under my notice in the spring of 1840, 



