It is not included by Mr. Rylands in his Catalogue of the
Birds of Lancashire ; yet it has been heard on the north-west
side of England as high up as Carlisle, but no farther.
On the eastern side, this bird is well known to frequent
Essex, Suffolk, Norfolk, some of the more wooded parts of
Lincolnshire, and several parts of Yorkshire ; but not higher
than five miles north of the city of York, as I learn from my
friend and correspondent Mr. Thomas Allis. The Nightingale
has not, I believe, been heard in Scotland, or in the Scottish
islands; which, considering that it does visit Denmark, is
also extraordinary. An attempt to establish the Nightingale
in Scotland is thus recorded in a note to an edition of
White’s Selborne, published in Edinburgh. “ It has been
generally believed that the migratory songsters, both old and
young, return to their native haunts in the breeding season.
From -this circumstance it is believed, that if any of these
could be bred beyond the ordinary limits of their incubation,
they would return in the following season to their birth-place.
Impressed with this belief, Sir John Sinclair, Bart., long
known for his patriotism, commissioned the late Mr. Dickson
of Covent Garden to purchase for him as many Nightingale’s
eggs as he could procure, at a shilling each. This was
accordingly done ; the eggs carefully packed in wool, and
transmitted to Sir John by the mail. Sir John employed
several men to find, and take care of, the nests of several
Robins, in places where the eggs might be deposited and
hatched with security. Lhe Robins’ eggs were removed, and
replaced by those of the Nightingale, which were all sat upon,
hatched in due time, and the young brought up by the foster-
parents. The songsters flew when fully fledged, and were
observed for some time afterwards near the places where they
were incubated. In September, the usual migratory period,
they disappeared, and never returned to the place of their
birth.”
M. Nilsson says that the Nightingale arrives in Sweden
by the 1st of May; and Pennant, in his Arctic Zoology,
says this bird visits the temperate parts of Russia and
some parts of Siberia. It breeds in Germany, France, Spain,
Provence, and Ita ly ; but leaves even the most southern parts
of this last-named country by the end of September, or early
in October, to pass the winter in North Africa, Egypt, and
Syria. Mr. Strickland saw this bird at Smyrna on the 5th
of April. It also visits the islands of the Grecian Archipelago.
The beak is brown ; the irides hazel: the head, and all the
upper parts of the body and wings, of a uniform rich brown,
tinged with reddish chestnut; the tail-feathers still more rufous,
and rather rounded in form : all the under surface of the
bird dull greyish white ; the chin, and the lower part of the
breast, of a lighter tint than the throat and chest; under
tail-coverts pale reddish white; legs, toes, and claws, brown.
The whole length of the bird, six inches and three-eighths.
From the carpus to the end of the longest primary, three
inches and one-quarter : the first quill-feather very short, t e
second equal in length to the fifth, the third the longest in
the wing.
The female in plumage resembles the male.
Young birds have buff-coloured spots on the tips of the
feathers of the upper surface of the body ; those on the under
surface have dark margins.