island : but then they are always mentioned as rari- 

 ties, and somewhat out of the common course of 

 things; but as to redwings and fieldfares, no sports- 

 man or naturalist has ever 3^et, that I could hear, 

 pretended to have found the nest or young of those 

 species in any part of these kingdoms. And I the 

 more admire at this instance as extraordinary, since, 

 to all appearance, the same food in summer as well 

 as in winter might support them here which main- 

 tains their congeners, the blackbirds and thrushes, 

 did they choose to stay the summer through. Hence 

 it appears that it is not food alone w^hich determines 

 some species of birds with regard to their stay or de- 

 parture. Fieldfares and redwings disappear sooner 

 or later, according as the warm weather comes on 

 earlier or later, for I weW remember, after that 

 dreadful winter, 1739-40, that cold north-east winds 

 continued to blow on through April and May, and 

 that these kinds of birds (what few remained of 

 them) did not depart as usual, but were seen linger- 

 ing about till the beginning of June. 



The best authority that we can have for the nidi- 

 fication of the birds above-mentioned in any district, 

 is the testimony of faunists that have written pro- 

 fessedly the natural history of particular countries. 

 Now, as to the fieldfare, Linn^us, in his Fauna 

 Suecica," says of it, that it builds in the largest 

 trees,'* — maximis in arboribus nidificat;" and of the 

 redwing he says, in the same place, that it builds in 



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