KOTES AttD QUERIES. 65 



over in scattered groups, without intermission, till after dark. During the 

 night the temperature steadily fell, and at 10 o'clock on the morning of the 

 6th it stood at 22° against the house. On going into my garden at that 

 hour, I found on the path, by the side of a thick holly tree close to the 

 house, a frozen hen Blackcap, Sylvia atricapilla, doubtless the same which 

 we had observed a fortnight before (on Dec. 22nd), and which had at last 

 succumbed to the bitter cold. It was not emaciated, like most of the Red- 

 wings and Thrushes we examined, but the stomach contained nothing but a 

 little mucous matter, with no special character which the microscope could 

 determine." 



From a point still further westward, the Rev. E. C. Spicer, of Throw- 

 leigh Rectory, Devon, writes: — "An extraordinary flight of birds was 

 observed in many parts of Devon on the morning of Dec. 21st, after the 

 first heavy fall of snow took place at the beginning of the present severe 

 weather. At 8 o'clock on Sunday morning (Dec. 21st) I was astonished at 

 a continuous stream of Skylarks flying overhead in a westerly direction. 

 The flight continued for more than an hour after that, in the most astonishing 

 numbers. Over five hundred were counted in three minutes, and the cloud 

 of birds seemed endless, in every direction. An old farmer here said that 

 he had seen a similar thing about ten years ago. The birds then were 

 found on the estuaries, and by the sea-coast of Cornwall, where they died 

 by thousands. Several letters have appeared in the local papers announcing 

 a similar migration on the same morning, so that there must have been 

 millions of birds on the wing. One correspondent mentions other birds — 

 Thrushes, Blackbirds, &c. — as well, but here I saw only Skylarks. I have 

 seen no record of their destination. It would be interesting to know if any 

 of your readers could tell us where the birds went. They were all flying 

 towards Cornwall. I observed also large detached flocks of Plover, flying 

 towards Dartmoor, on ths edge of which I live, in a southerly direction. 

 The appearance of these birds, all hastening away in perfect silence, was 

 almost weird in the dead stillness, all the ground and every twig and bush 

 being covered with deep snow, and not a breath of wind stirring. The 

 event has certainly j ustified their instincts, for until to-day (Jan. 1st) it has 

 been almost impossible for the birds to obtain any food, except from the 

 berries, which this year are exceptionally plentiful. Large flocks of Field- 

 fares have taken possession of my garden, where there are a great many 

 hollies, and at any noise they rush out of the bushes like a swarm of flies. 

 It is curious to watch them from the windows in the morning, some ten or 

 a dozen sitting in the snow under the bushes, mere dejected heaps of 

 feathers, occasionally pecking at the berries which their busy comrades have 

 knocked off. The Thrushes are in the wildest excitement. They sit above 

 the hollies, quivering and chattering, and occasionally darting upon a luck- 

 less Fieldfare, whose unwonted presence they resent most strongly. I do 



