236 
OUR WINTER VISITORS. 
[Nature and Art, December 1, 18G8. 
less thousands of weary wanderers first close after 
their long flight over the many miles of wild and 
stormy sea. 
“ We hear the beat 
Of their pinions fleet, 
As from the land of snow and sleet 
They seek a southern lea. 
“We hear the cry 
Of their voices high 
Falling- dreamily through the sky, 
But their forms we cannot see.” 
It is mainly during October that this great 
movement Southward takes place, and it is in 
that month we may almost daily expect the arrival 
of some one or other of the varied tribes of the 
Northern bird-army, which will now for some 
months find a home in the more genial climate of 
our island, till the warm suns and bursting vege- 
tation of spring again impel them northward to 
their summer breeding-haunts, in the Norwegian 
pine-forests, or amidst the dreary solitudes of the 
Lap falls. As yet how little do we understand the 
spring of that mysterious instinct which induces 
these many thousand of winged creatures, with 
such unerring punctuality, to make twice a year so 
long a journey, — in the spring northward, often to 
far up within the Ai'ctic circle, and again in the 
autumn leading them back again to the middle and 
southern districts of Europe. All we can know 
is, that 
“ There is a Power whose care 
Teaches their way along that pathless coast, 
The desert and illimitable air, — 
Lone wandering, but not lost.” 
Fortunate it is for the poor birds; that they have 
these thousands of square miles of “happy hunting- 
grounds ” to retreat to — wild solitudes where the 
foot of man seldom enters — untrodden save by the 
nomadic Lap and his reindeer — nature’s own wild 
gardens, where many a lovely arctic plant is “ born 
to blush unseen.” There in peace they can devote 
themselves to the duties of incubation, and then 
with renewed strength and numbers, again marshal 
their ranks to seek a warmer clime. How strong 
must be the motive which induces our migratory 
birds to make these long journeys ; for be the 
weather stormy or fine — the season open or severe 
— when the time comes for their appearance, so 
surely, within a day or two, shall we find them in 
their accustomed winter haunts. It would be an 
interesting sight could we watch the departure of 
one of these large flocks of birds from the pine- 
fringed shores of the North. It is seldom, however, 
that these great migratory movements can be 
observed by man, as they almost invariably take 
place during the night. We might suppose that 
many of these birds, as the little “ Gold-crested 
Wren,” the Fieldfare, and Redwing, all such birds, 
in fact, as feed during the day, would find some diffi- 
culty in breaking off their regular habit of retiring 
to roost at sundown ; but this migratory passion 
must, indeed, be strong and all-powerful, thus to 
overrule their ordinary habits. It is a well-known 
fact that birds of passage kept in confinement 
exhibit peculiar restlessness and anxiety at their 
accustomed migratory season ; and this restlessness 
is shown even when they have been long removed 
from all the associations of their wild existence. 
It by no means follows that those birds which 
first leave our shores in the spring for their 
northern breeding-ground are amongst the first to 
return — the reverse is often the case. The Grey 
Plover and Whimbral, both birds of passage, are 
amongst the last to leave our shores. We have 
seen them in considerable flocks as late as the end 
of May. The Grey Plover breeds far up within the 
Arctic circle, and its nest has rarely been found. 
The breeding-grounds of the Whimbral are more 
extensive — from the north of Scotland to the most 
northern districts of Europe. Both these species 
may again be found, in small parties, on our coast 
in August. The Redwings invariably leave before 
the Fieldfares. We have repeatedly observed large 
flocks of the latter on the east coast during the 
second week in May. 
The Redwings return about the last week in 
October, the Fieldfares about the same time. Red- 
wings never sing in England, and their winter notes 
are very different to their summer song. Those 
who have listened to the wild, sweet notes of this 
bird in its native pine-forests, poured forth hour 
after hour in the calm beauty of a northern summer 
night, will understand why it has earned the 
sobriquet of the Swedish nightingale. 
It is a wonderful fact, and showing the great 
power of endurance on the wing that these mi- 
gratories j)Ossess, that they can in one flight thus 
bridge across the Northern Ocean. The distance 
from the nearest part of the coast of Norway to the 
east coast of Yorkshire, say Flamborough Head, is 
about 380 miles ; and calculating the speed of a 
strong-winged bird, as the Woodcock, Fieldfare, &c., 
at the average rate, for the journey, of sixty miles 
an hour, they would occupy between six and seven 
hours in the passage. But it is more surprising 
still that the smaller species of birds, as the little 
Golden-crested Wren, are able to make this stormy 
passage. Thousands of these exquisite and delicate 
little creatures arrive on our eastern coast about 
the second week in October, usually preceding the 
Woodcocks. When we look at the small wings and 
delicate, fragile form of these little wanderers, we 
are lost in wonder at their marvellous endurance, 
and the instinct which has guided their tiny flight 
across these many miles of the wild North Sea. 
How many thousands of times must those small 
wings have beaten the “ cold, thin atmosphere ” 
before they closed to rest on the shingly beach of 
England ! Spurn Point is a great rendezvous for 
the Gold-crests before proceeding inland, and we 
have seen them in considerable numbers on the 
Lincolnshire side of the Humber. Mr. Morris, in 
his “ British Birds,’’ relates the fact of a flock of 
Gold-crests alighting on the rigging of a vessel 
fourteen miles from hind, off’ Whitby. The Red- 
wings, and other birds of passage, have also been 
known to settle in large flocks on the rigging of 
vessels in the North Sea, no doubt finding it a 
