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We shall not now be surprised to hear that the swallow, as well as several other British birds, such as the nightingale and the quail, should find its way to the shores of Africa. Indeed, if it possess the strength and swiftness of the American blue-bird,—and there is every reason to believe that it exceeds this point rather than falls short, it would require but a small resting place in its passage, and arrive with ease on the second day.

As to the mode of migration, this differs in different species, some assembling in vast flocks, and taking their flight together, such as swallows, geese, &c., while others seem to prefer plying their solitary way. Of this latter kind is the cuckoo, which, indeed, is seldom at any time observed in company even with its mate. But, what would scarcely be expected, and cannot easily be accounted for on the analogy of the other habits of the feathered family, there seem to be some kinds of birds, the males of which take their migratory flight unaccompanied by the females, who follow them at the interval of some days; and others, the females of which lead the way, and leave their mates behind. The nightingale and the wheatear are said to be of the ungallant habits of the first-mentioned species.

While those birds, whose food fails, or becomes scanty in winter, take their flight, as we have seen, to more southern climates, their place is partly supplied by the emigration of winged strangers from the shores of the north, actuated obviously by a similar impulse, namely, that of escaping from a more rigorous region, and finding a supply of congenial food, when that of their summer haunts is about to be exhausted. These are chiefly seafowl, or the frequenters of lakes, or the inhabitants of fens and marshes; and it is, doubtless, the approach, though not perhaps the actual arrival, of frost, about to bind their more northerly places of resort in icy fetters, and thus to render them unfit for their subsistence, which has made the instinct necessary that drives them southward.

It is worthy of notice, and what might confidently be expected from the nature of the case, that although our summer visitants are not confined to any particular order

or tribe, including, not only both land and water-fowl, but devourers of all different kinds of food, yet of those which reside amongst us, in winter, there are none insectivorous, and very few granivorous. It is also remarkable, that, while all our summer birds of passage hatch their young in this country, few, if any, of the winter kinds remain to execute this necessary duty. They leave our shores before the breeding season commences, to give a birthplace to their progeny in their own native regions of Sweden, Norway, or Iceland, some of them, such as the snow-bunting, even approaching the Arctic Circle, and performing the office of incubation on the ice-bound coast of Greenland, or amidst the icebergs of Spitzbergen.

It is impossible not to admire the care which Providence has thus manifested, at once to preserve the winged tribes from the fatal effects of a change of climate, too severe for their nature, and to cheer the short summer of the northern regions with the presence of inhabitants, which only a few days of a stern polar winter would destroy. The spring, summer, and autumn of Spitzbergen, for example, are all comprised in the space of a few weeks. Even so late as the end of April, the whole island is a wild and dreary waste of ice and snow; not a sound of animated beings is to be heard; though the sun, after an absence of four dismal months, has appeared for some time, skirting, with his cold and languid lamp, the edge of the bleak horizon. Gradually, however, he rises higher in the southern heavens; and in May or June, his never-setting orb sheds a genial warmth through the placid air, and on the smiling earth. The change is like that of magic. The snows dissolve, and rush in torrents to the sea. The ground appears, first in spots, and then in one vast unbroken extent, along the valleys, and even on the less elevated hills. Instantly the powers of vegetation burst forth with an energy of which we can scarcely form a conception. In a few days, a land, which seemed the region of perpetual snow, is clothed with the loveliest verdure, and becomes instinct with life. The gaunt bear leaves his cave, where he had spent the winter in a happy

torpidity, while numerous insects start from their winter tombs, and flutter gladly in the balmy atmosphere. It is at this auspicious period, that the snow-buntings, and perhaps some other winter birds, having lingered probably for a time in the intervening islands of Shetland, Faroe, and Iceland, arrive on this awakened coast, which they render vocal with their song; and, while they find a congenial climate, and food adapted to their nature, immediately begin the important offices required for the continuance of the species, obtaining, in this remote island, a retreat comparatively free from the molestation of their enemies. In a few weeks, the sun begins again to lose its genial warmth, and symptoms of approaching winter warn these annual visitants to return to a more temperate climate; but this interval has sufficed, not only for the hatching of the brood, but for their being reared and cherished till they have acquired a strength of wing enabling them to accompany their adventurous parents, in shaping their pathless way for hundreds of miles across a stormy and apparently shoreless ocean, without a single landmark in the distant horizon to direct their course.

The case of the little snow-bunting is only a particular instance, though a striking one, of that wonderful instinct which belongs to so many of the feathered family. It marks, in a very lively manner, the peculiar features, the extent, and the beneficent intentions of this impulse of a wonder-working power; and, while it fills the pious mind with an undefinable feeling of awe, under the sense of a present Deity, directs it to the cheering doctrines, and blessed promises, of Revealed Truth, and may well serve to increase its confidence in the never-failing protection of a reconciled Father, who bestows those secret and mysterious influences of Divine grace, through which the Christian is led by a way which he knows not," from the wintry scenes of earth, to the glories of an eternal

summer.

The snow-bird of America is another of the feathered tribe, which the hand of a beneficent Providence drives northwards to fulfil some important end. When the weather begins to be warm, the snow-bird moves towards

the colder regions, and arrives about the Hudson's Bay Factory in June, whence it continues its course still further north, where it breeds. This kind is so numerous as to be found scattered over the greater part, probably the whole, of the northern regions of North America, in great profusion. Speaking of this remarkable species, Mr. Wilson says, "In the circuitous route I travelled, of more than 1800 miles, I never passed a day, and scarcely a mile, without seeing numbers of these birds, and frequently large flocks of several thousands.' ""

The impulse which urges these tenants of the air to seek the wilds of the north, is evidently connected with the instinct which leads them to propagate the species; and indeed some naturalists are of opinion, that, in all instances of migration, the same instinct operates. However this may be, it is certain that these little creatures find a more secure retreat in the countries near the Arctic Circle, for the important purpose of incubation, than could readily be chosen in the circle of their summer haunts. But, while they thus escape many formidable enemies, they are probably not altogether free from danger; for their appearance will be hailed as a seasonable boon of Providence, by the scattered inhabitants of these inhospitable regions, who must find, in this annual supply of dainty food, thus mysteriously sent them by an Unseen Hand, an agreeable and wholesome variety, after being confined, during the dismal winter months, to the unvarying sameness of that coarse and oily nourishment, which their rude skill extracts from the surrounding seas.

EIGHTH WEEK-WEDNESDAY.

HYBERNATION.-BIRDS WHICH PARTIALLY MIGRATE.

THERE are some of the British feathered tribes, which, although they do not pass beyond the sea, are yet, to a

certain extent, migratory within the bounds of the island. These are chiefly influenced in their change of residence, by the desire of finding a more remote retreat, for the purpose of incubation, or of acquiring a more plentiful supply of food, or, perhaps, in some instances, a more sheltered place of residence during the stormy months. "Of these," says Mr. Rennie, " may be mentioned, in our country, the curlew and golden-plover, which in winter reside chiefly along the shores, while in summer they betake themselves to the inland lakes and moors; the lapwing, which seems to move northwards in winter ; the linnet, which in that season deserts the hilly regions, and approaches the habitations of man; and the dipper, which in summer ascends the streams, towards their sources.'

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But it is in continental countries, and especially in America, where interminable forests are mingled with districts and bounded by regions cultivated by the labor of man, and teeming with crops of grain, that the most remarkable instances of this kind of partial migration take place. The countless multitude of pigeons in that country, which, at particular seasons, shift their residence in continuous and almost interminable flocks, have long been the admiration of travellers. Audubon, in his usual graphic manner, describes a flight of this tribe, of which he was an eyewitness. "In the autumn of 1813," says he, "I left my house at Henderson, on the banks of the Ohio, on my way to Louisville. In passing over the Barrens, a few miles below Hardensburgh, I observed the pigeons flying from northeast to southwest in greater numbers than I thought I had ever seen them before; and feeling an inclination to count the flocks that might pass within the reach of my eye in one hour, I dismounted, seated myself on an eminence, and began to mark with my pencil, making a dot for every flock that passed. In a short time, finding the task that I had undertaken impracticable, as the birds poured on in countless multitudes, I rose, and counting the dots then put down, found 163 had been made in twenty-one minutes.

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