Birds. 221 



nerant aquilae columhas,'' and therefore 1 hope a " chaffy leaf" on the arrival of some 

 species of summer migrants in Leicestershire may not prove altogether uninteresting 

 to the ornithological readers of your periodical. Migration has been about ten days 

 earlier in this district than it was in the spring of 1842 ; while from the prevalence of 

 cold and dry easterly winds, succeeding the season of the equinox, observers might 

 naturally have expected that the time of " the coming of birds " would be signally re- 

 tarded. Several species of insects came abroad on wing much earlier this season than I 

 have observed for several years past, especially those belonging to our diurnal Lepidop- 

 tera. On the 31st of March, the chiff-chaff (/Sy/vm Hippolais) was heard in the planta- 

 tions of Tooley park, throwing its wild wood notes o'er leafless bough and flowerless 

 path, Eay's wagtail {Motacilla i^aw), I observed on the7thof x\pril,upon the sheltered 

 and warm pastures within the mural walls of the Abbey of Leicester. The swallow 

 {Hirundo rustica) was observed, April 9th, hawking for flies over the low and sheltered' 

 grounds beside the river Soar, near to Leicester castle. The wryneck {Yunx Torquilla) 

 was heard to emit its kestril -like cry on the9tli of April, among the elms of Stoney-gate 

 house : but the martin (Hirundo urhica) and sand-martin {H. riparia) were not seen in 

 this district till the 18th. On that day the cry of the cuckoo (Cuculus canorus) was heard 

 in the woodlands of Anstyand Newton Linford ; and in Bradgate park, on the 18th, T 

 also observed the whin-chat {Saxicola rubetra), sione-chsLi (S. rubicola), a,nd!ia.\\oyf-chdit 

 {S.CEnanthe). The redstart (Sylvia Phoenicura) appeared on the 19th, at the ruins, in 

 Bradgate park ; and in Ansty lordship, on the same day, I observed the whitethroat 

 (S. cinerea). The full, mellow and rich minstrelsy of the black-cap (S. airicapilla) I 

 heard on the 19th of April, emitted from the boughs of some tall poplars growing be- 

 side the mill below Grooby pool. On the same day the " weet weet'''' of the sandpiper 

 (Tringa hypoleucos) fell upon the ripple of the same water. The merry note of the 

 tree pipit (Anthus arhoreus) awoke our woodlands on the 19th ; while our osier-holts 

 and willow-beds drank in the sweet music of the willow-warbler (Sylvia Trochilus). 

 The sedge-warbler (S. Phragmitis) and reed-warblers' (S. arundinacea) "babblings" 

 I heard on the 20th in the willow-bed skirting the Soar below Leicester castle. The 

 summer cry of the land-rail (Rallus Crex), was heard in the woodlands of Ansty on 

 the 30th ; and on May 3rd I observed a pair of swifts sailing over the village of Ayles- 

 ton, in a north-easterly direction. " Swifts arrive in pairs in the middle districts of 

 our island ; '' in that respect they differ essentially in their economy from the true Hi- 

 rundines. But it would, I am sure, aid the cause of scientific research, were your 

 Cornish correspondents to record their observations on the manners of these interesting 

 migrants. Mr. Yarrell and Prof. MacGillivray, in their Histories of British Birds, 

 are both silent on the subject; which is somewhat remarkable, especially in the latter 

 writer, whose history of the swift (Cypselus murarius) is very elaborate and interesting. 

 Mr. Bree, I know, is of opinion, that the number of swifts visiting our shores annually 

 decreases ; but whatever lack of numbers may take place in the vicinity of Coventry 

 and Allesley, many years' close observation on their periodical shiftings, indicate no 

 such decline in their numbers, so far as they have been observed by me in Leicester- 

 shire. — James Harley ; Leicester^ May 5, 1843. 



Note on the occurrence of the White-winged Crossbill in Scotland. A white-winged 

 crossbill (Loxia leucoptera) was shot in this neighbourhood in the month of February, 

 1841. I had an opportunity of examining the bird, which had been sent to a gun- 

 smith in Jedburgh to be stuffed, and it appeared to me to be a full-grown female, but 

 of this I cannot be certain. Small flocks of the common crossbill sometimes visit us 



