tioned having procured the nest of this bird from the hills
in the neighbourhood of Wooler. The Ring Ouzel breeds
also in various parts of Scotland. Dr. Fleming says it is
not rare on the Pentland Hills near Edinburgh; and Mr.
Rennie has seen their nests in a wild of mountainous country
behind Carntable in Argyleshire. In Sutherlandshire,
Mr. Selby found the bird abundant in June 1884 in all the
mountainous parts; and Mr. Bullock exhibited, in his collection
at the Egyptian Hall, a male, female, nest, and eggs,
taken in the Hebrides; but I do not find any record of this
bird frequenting Orkney or Shetland.
The Ring Ouzel visits Denmark and Sweden. In the
latter country M. Nilsson considers it a rare bird, which, he
says, arrives in April and departs in autumn. Of the Ring
Ouzel in Norway, Mr. Hewitson says it was often seen,
“ frequenting many of the wooded rocks, and enlivening the
most bleak and desolate islands with its sweet song. It
shares with the Redwing the name of Nightingale, and often
delighted us in our midnight visits amongst the islands.'”
Further north than this the Ring Ouzel does not appear to
venture; nor is it found in Siberia or in Russia.
In its appearance the Ring Ouzel resembles the Blackbird
; but it frequents wild and hilly uncultivated tracts of
country, rather than those which are enclosed and inhabited.
They fly rapidly, are shy and difficult of approach, unless
you are near their nest, when they become bold and clamorous,
endeavouring by various arts to entice the intruder
to follow them away from their treasured eggs or young.
The nest is generally built on or near the ground, sometimes
on banks by the sides of streams, occasionally placed
at the base of a stone, a stump, or a bush, which serves as a
shelter. Dr. Fleming says that in Scotland it makes its
nest among heath ; and the nests seen by Mr. Rennie in
Argyleshire were placed on the sides of heathy banks, not
under a bush. The nest, according to Mr. Hewitson,
though differently situated, “ is very similar to that of the
Blackbird, being outwardly composed of coarse grasses, with
a slight layer of clay, and thickly lined with fine dry grass
the eggs four or five in number, of a light blue, speckled
and spotted with reddish brown ; the length one inch two
lines, and ten lines in breadth. Mr. Heysham of Carlisle
has seen the young birds, in that vicinity, fully fledged on
the 15th of June.
The food selected by this species is similar to that sought
for by the Blackbird. I t consists of snails, insects, fruit,
hawberries before the birds leave us for the winter, and ivy-
berries when they return in the spring. Sir William Jar-
dine, in a note to an edition of "White’s Selborne, says of
these birds, “ Before migrating to their winter-quarters, and
often ere the duties of incubation are over, they leave their
mountainous haunts, and descend to the nearest gardens,
where they commit severe depredations among the cherries,
gooseberries, &c. They also frequent holly-hedges and the
mountain-ash, whenever the fruit of these trees is so early as
to be of service during their passage. They are known to
the country-people under the title of Mountain Blackbird. ’
Buffon says, they feed largely on grapes in France, and are
themselves, at that time, delicious eating: he adds also,
that, in consequence of their habit of forming their nests on
the ground ; they are sometimes called Merles terres. These
birds visit gardens in the vicinity of the Forest of Orleans.
The voice of the Ring Ouzel possesses, according to Mr.
Selby, a few clear and powerful notes its cry of alarm,
when disturbed, very closely resembles that of the Blackbird.
The Ring Ouzel is not unfrequently seen in flocks of
twenty or thirty about the end of October along the line of
our southern coast, when preparing for their departure. To
the Rev. Robert Holdsworth, of Brixham, I am indebted for