Birds. 2573 



others of the dentirostral or insectivorous division of the Insessores, hitherto supposed 

 to be constantly resident, at least in the south of England, leave this country in con. 

 siderable flocks about the beginning of autumn, and return to it in diminished num- 

 bers during the ensuing spring. It would be taxing your patience too much if I were 

 to transcribe from my journal all the notes and records committed to paper within the 

 last few years which bear upon this particular subject ; such an infliction might test 

 even your ornithological zeal too severely, and would necessarily exceed the limits of 

 many letters ; but feeling, as I do, that the subject is one of more than common inte- 

 rest, I propose to select two well-known examples, which have heretofore been sup- 

 posed to be constant residents in our island, the goldfinch and the pied wagtail ; the 

 one a hard-billed bird, the other soft-billed : and an account of their migrations will 

 be sufficient to illustrate my theory, and perhaps comprehend as much as would prove 

 interesting to you on this subject. 



" Of the departure of large flocks of goldfinches in the autumn I have already 

 spoken : a few, however, remain in different parts of the county throughout the entire 

 year, and in winter are generally found on wild, bushy ground, among the remote 

 valleys of the Downs, or on hedges near waste land or commons. The periodical 

 arrival of fresh birds in the spring is well known even to the most inexperienced bird- 

 catchers in the neighbourhood of Brighton, and anxiously expected by them for many 

 days previously : the goldfinches which have remained all the winter are called by 

 them • harbour birds,' meaning that they have sojourned, or harboured — as the local 

 expression is — here during that season : those which arrive in April are called ' flight 

 birds.' When the latter are expected the bird-catcher watches his nets with an 

 anxious countenance, and his disappointment is great, if, upon releasing from the 

 meshes a newly captured prisoner, he perceives by the dull-coloured back, dirty red 

 forehead, and general shabbiness of the plumage, that it is only what he contemptu- 

 ously terms ' a harbour bird.' Far different are his feelings when he entraps one 

 with a light-coloured back, snow-white cheeks, and bright vermilion forehead ; he 

 knows then that ' the flight ' has commenced, and the hour of sunrise finds him at 

 his post on the following morning, anxious to avail himself of the precious moments. 



" It is worthy of remark that the ' harbour birds ' are much more shy than the 

 newly arrived * flight birds,' which, with their plumage advanced to that of the 

 breeding season— the effect of a warmer climate — are comparatively tame and easily 

 caught ; they are at once attracted by the decoy bird, and fly into the net in unsus- 

 picious haste. 



" Goldfinches again become numerous in October, when detached parties, including 

 the young of the year, which have been spread through other portions of the island 

 during the summer, approach the coast, and pass eastward in succession, until they 

 find — on the shores of Kent as I imagine — a favourable spot for crossing the Chan- 

 nel." — page 77. 



I shall conclude this notice of Mr. Knox's ' Rambles ' with his spirited account 

 of a shooting ally in the person of a little merlin. I must not, however, abandon the 

 1 Birds of Sussex' here, but beg to announce my intention of abstracting Mr. Knox's 

 List, arranging the species somewhat differently, and showing the relative proportion 

 of residents and migrants : the materials for this are so ample that it would be inex- 

 cusable to miss so excellent an opportunity of adding these ornithological statistics to 

 those already published in the pages of the ' Zoologist.' This task must be reserved 



vii 2 1 



