140 
MERULIDiE. 
to sit on the eggs until the brood was produced. Two of the 
young were taken out of the nest when they were ready to be 
transferred to a cage, but the thrush nevertheless continued to tend 
the remaining three, until they all took wing. A grey-linnet's 
nest containing young was put in a cage, into which the 
parent bird went regularly to feed them. The cage was then 
moved gradually nearer and nearer to the cottage, until at last 
brought within doors, whither the parent bird followed and fed 
the young. 
Sky-larks have frequently been known to follow their nests 
when shifted by boys from place to place — occasionally several 
times in a day — across a field, or until the young were put in a 
cage, and placed beside the cottage. The parent lark then 
alighted on a little piece of board placed outside the cage as a 
perch for her, and from it, fed the young regularly through the 
wires. In such instances, the cottages were in the fields. In other 
cases, when the young were so far advanced as not to require the 
warmth derived from the parent sitting on the nest, this was rodded 
over to prevent their escape when fledged, and the old bird came 
and fed them. Both these practices respecting sky-larks, and 
more especially the former one, were common some years ago in 
the county of Down. 
THE BED WING. 
Eelt. Small Eelt. 
Turdus iliacus , Linn. 
Is a regular winter visitant, its migration, like that of 
the fieldfare, extending over the island. 
In the north, it generally arrives about the middle of October,* 
sometimes early in the month ; and remains until the beginning 
or middle of April : to the end of this month its departure was 
* A sporting friend remarks that he never saw redwings so plentiful any where as at 
Aberarder, Inverness-shire, from the end of the first week, until the 18th of October, 
1840. 
