2480 Birds. 



missel thrush is listened to 'attentively, whilst engaged in song, he 

 will, I think, generally be heard to give forth three distinct notes to- 

 gether ; then leave a short pause ; then three notes again, and so on : 

 the cock bird is the chief songster, who essays his powers in the 

 early spring to induce a partner to join him : and this is the reason, 

 perhaps, why most country people call this bird i thrice cock,' from 

 the male giving forth his thrice-repeated note. 



White's Thrush (Tardus Whitei). In certain seasons a thrush 

 comes here, which — from the descriptions given by authors — I sup- 

 pose to be Turdus Whitei. These birds are met with in company 

 with redwings and fieldfares, are very difficult to shoot, about the size 

 of the song thrush, but heavier. On October 25, 1847, some appeared 

 at the same time with the song thrushes ; but I was not sufficiently 

 fortunate to shoot one. 



Song Thrush (Turdus musicus). It is now some years since I paid 

 attention to the migration of the song thrush, and I have now no he- 

 sitation in recording the fact. Every autumn, sooner or later according 

 to circumstances, but always just when the leaf is falling, our neigh- 

 bourhood is visited by numbers of thrushes: the most ordinary ob- 

 server would almost notice this circumstance, for it is very apparent 

 from the increased quantity that are feeding in the bottoms of hedges, 

 by copses, and even amongst turnips in the open fields ; nevertheless 

 these thrushes, unless passing over, are not in flocks, but in parties of 

 from two to five or six. If you wander by a brook fringed with thorn 

 and alder bushes, which is a very favourite haunt, you will notice that 

 from the first bush you get to perhaps will spring up two or three 

 thrushes : as you proceed, the next bush will furnish two or three 

 more, and so on ; so that, should you follow the course of the brook 

 for a mile, you will find that you have started several hundred, al- 

 though never more than four or five may take wing at one time. The 

 greater part of these stay perhaps a week or a fortnight, and then dis- 

 appear, leaving, however, a considerable number behind, which stay 

 till spring. Occasionally flocks pass over on the wing, taking a south 

 and south-easterly direction, as if on the way to their winter quarters. 

 A flock perhaps consists of sixty or seventy birds, which generally 

 keep compactly together, like starlings, making steadily for their des- 

 tination, and not alighting on any object. Sometimes they fly very 

 near the ground, almost within gun-shot. I have no doubt that num- 

 bers every year leave the forests of Scotland and the North, as pointed 

 out by Mr. Jordan (Zool. 493), and repair to the warmer counties of 

 England on the southern border. The habit which thrushes have of 



