more to mount aloft and circle as before. These performances
are varied also by the flock becoming momentarily
invisible or partly so, through the birds as they wheel turning
their wings edgeways to the spectator’s eye, and then,
on a calm day, the noise caused by the sudden change of
direction will reach his ear from the distance like the rumbling
sound of a heavy carriage on a hard road. Few things
of the kind are more entertaining than to watch a flock of
Starlings as they rise with the Rooks, Daws or Lapwings
in whose company they may be. While the Lapwings
slowly marshal themselves into their accustomed formation,
or the Rooks and Daws, with not much more speed,
betake themselves skyward after some uncertain beating of
the air, »the organization of the Starlings seems to be perfect
from the moment they leave the ground, and they shoot
ahead of and across the flight of the larger birds ; or, wheeling
round, pass through the comparatively unformed ranks
without the slightest disturbance of their own array—now
on this side, now on that—and, returning, should the alarm
prove needless, perhaps to the spot whence they had risen,
resume feeding as busily as ever, long before their incongruous
associates have been able to judge of the probable
danger and to act in accordance with their sagacity.
In winter comparatively few Starlings are left in most
parts of the interior of England. Even about midsummer,
as has already been stated, some begin to cross the sea, and
it would seem to be the ordinary habit of this species to
move westward as autumn approaches. The regularity of
its appearance at that season in Wales, Cornwall and
Ireland was observed long ago, before it had become, as it
now is, more plentiful as a resident in those parts ; but
even at the present day the influx of large flocks from the
eastward is very evident. In like manner, as the experience
of our lighthouse-keepers tells us,* we receive great additions
from the Continent in the fall of the year. Most of
the strangers, no doubt, pass on, but many tarry for a time
* Excepting p e rhaps Skylarks, no b ird s a re more freq u en tly a ttra c te d to th e
la n te rn s th a n Starlings.
and join the majority of our home-bred birds in their seaside
resorts or along the banks of tidal rivers. In such
places marine animals, and especially crustaceans, furnish
much of their food, and to obtain it they examine the heaps
of washed-up seaweed or turn over the stones with theii
bill. The minority which stay about their own home are,
during hard frost, driven to great extremity, and, pinched
with hunger, depend chiefly on what may be got in sheep-
folds and cattle-lairs; but, when the weather permits, they
assiduously follow the plough and in the pastures, beside
the grubs of Tipulce so constantly present, there is often
I good store of food accessible, except in time of snow,
under dried cowdung. With the first indication of
returning spring our Starlings hasten to their old breeding-
quarters and await the arrival of that glad season.*
The Starling is now found in almost every part of the
United Kingdom. On the Scottish mainland it used to be
comparatively scarce, and it was rare m the southern and
midland counties even when Macgillivray wrote. ^ Mr. Cray
says that its appearance in the cultivated districts was an
event so recent as to have excited universal attention. But
at present there are few if any counties in which it does
not regularly breed more or less plentifully, and it seems to
have always frequented the rocky parts of the coast, an to
have been especially abundant in the Hebrides, Orkney an
Shetland, in all of which it occupies the same haunts as the
Rock-Dove and the Cormorant. Of Wales (though information
is far less precise) and Cornwall, much the same
may be averred (Zool. p. 3045 and s.s. pp. 137, 455); but
* I n th u s a ttem p tin g to tra c e th e S ta rlin g ’s life th e E d ito r, besides h is own
observation, h a s be en a ssisted by in fo rm a tio n from sources fa r too n umerous to
mention. None of these, however, excels th e admirab le account given in
Stanley’s ‘ F am ilia r H isto ry of B ird s ’, w hich proves its au th o r to h ave been
u n su rpassed as an a ccurate observer a n d fa ith fu l
allowed him. But it m u st be remembered th a t, th o u g h one o e
of ornithological biography ever w ritten , i t h a d professedly b u t a local g g g |J
scene being la id a t Alderley in Cheshire. I n th e foregoing p a rag rap h s th e re ^as
been no in ten tio n of copying th a t in imitab le account, u 1 canno
to affect th e E d ito r in w ritin g th em , as from boyhood h e h a s n °w
by h e a rt, an d in d e ed i t is one th a t no lover of b ird s who h a s re a d i t can forget.
VOL. IT.