MIGRATION. 
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it is not a house and home already well known to them, 
whereon they alight. “ The Starlings,” remarks my father, 
“ do not think of building: this only enters their heads 
several weeks after their arrival. No; they rejoice at 
having found the old familiar home. 4 Yea, the Sparrow 
hath found her house,’ says the Psalmist. They creep 
in and out of the little box: the male sits on the top 
of the tree in which his residence is, and the female 
seems quite at home in the locality. It is just the 
same with Swallows. The Sand Martin recognizes the 
hole, even, in which its nest is, from amongst the rest, 
and enters it without the slightest hesitation. The 
common Swallow, which has bred in an outhouse, enters 
the same through the partially-open window or door, 
and greets its old nesting-place with evident pleasure. 
4 The Swallow has found her nest, where she may lay her 
young,’ says the Psalmist again.” 
Besides these we have other proofs. The bird-fancier 
and expert knows with certainty whether the Nightingale 
singing in his garden is a passing stranger or an old 
habitue. Our immortal Naumann knew all his little 
feathered friends, near his house, by their song. The 
Melodious Warbler, which we have before especially 
mentioned as breeding in our enclosure, was known to us 
by the inferior quality of its song, and on this account was 
called by us the “bungler:” the strain, indeed, was so 
execrably bad, that the few rich notes, which it did 
possess, were rarely heard, and then only by fits and 
starts. This bird visited our garden regularly during 
nine consecutive seasons. Thienemann once so tamed a 
Swallow that he could distinguish it from any other : it 
returned to him three years running. A bird-fancier 
reared two young Chaffinches from the same nest, and 
