THE EIELDFARE. 
103 
and some of the thousand islands, of Norway, chiefly to get 
eggs and information on the habits of migratory British 
birds, speaks of the redwing {Turdus iliacus) as being so- 
litary and shy ; while its loud, wild, and most delicious 
song seldom failed to cheer him and his companions, 
Messrs. Hancock and Johnson. In some parts of Norway 
the redwing is called the nightingale,^^ and well it deserves 
its name; for he says that ^^its clear, sweet song would oc- 
casionally dehght us during the hours of night, if the tw^o 
or three delightful hours of twilight, w^hich succeed the long 
day of a Norwegian summer, can be called night. The 
birds, like the other inhabitants of the country, seem loath 
to lose in sleep a portion of this short-lived season^.^^ 
About the end of April, in the year 1833, he noticed that 
the fieldfare {Tardus pilaris) left the neighbourhood of New- 
castle; and by the 14th of May our friend was among the woods 
of Norway, where he found the fieldfare had already com- 
menced the cares of the production of other colonies, to 
visit us in future years." He soon found a colony of field- 
fares, and we give, in his own w^ords, the result of his visit 
to it : We very soon forgot our toils in the delight which 
we experienced at the discovery of several of their nests, and 
* Hewitson's * British Eggs/ vol. i. p. 61. 
