crowd of birds that flock to our hedges in
the early summer; and perhaps it would be accurate to say that no
other area of equal extent, either in Europe or elsewhere, receives
so many feathered visitors. The English climate is the established
subject of abuse, yet it is the climate most preferred and sought by
the birds, who have the choice of immense continents.

Nothing that I have ever read of, or seen, or that I expect to see,
equals the beauty and the delight of a summer spent in our woods
and meadows. Green leaves and grass, and sunshine, blue skies, and
sweet brooks--there is nothing to approach it; it is no wonder the
birds are tempted to us. The food they find is so abundant, that
after all their efforts, little apparent diminution can be noticed;
to this fertile and lovely country, therefore, they hasten every
year. It might be said that the spring-birds begin to come to us in
the autumn, as early as October, when hedge-sparrows and
golden-crested wrens, larks, blackbirds, and thrushes, and many
others, float over on the gales from the coasts of Norway. Their
numbers, especially of the smaller birds, such as larks, are
immense, and their line of flight so extended that it strikes our
shores for a distance of two hundred miles. The vastness of these
numbers, indeed, makes me question whether they all come from
Scandinavia. That is their route; Norway seems to be the last land
they see before crossing; but I think it possible that their
original homes may have been farther still. Though many go back in
the spring, many individuals remain here, and rejoice in the plenty
of the hedgerows. As all roads of old time led to Rome, so do
bird-routes lead to these islands. Some of these birds appear to
pair in November, and so have settled their courtship long before
the crocuses of St. Valentine. Much difference is apparent in the
dates recorded of the arrivals in spring; they vary year by year,
and now one and now another bird presents itself first, so that I
shall not in these notes attempt to arrange them in strict order.

One of the first noticeable in southern fields is the common
wagtail. When his shrill note is heard echoing against the walls of
the outhouses as he rises from the ground, the carters and ploughmen
know that there will not be much more frost. If icicles hang from
the thatched eaves, they will not long hang, but melt before the
softer wind. The bitter part of winter is over. The wagtail is a
hou