Page:Bird Haunts and Nature Memories - Thomas Coward (Warne, 1922).pdf/72

44 was alive with goldcrests, on another robins, dunnocks, wrens, and a few belated warblers filled the bushes. Redstarts, stonechats, blue tits, even a couple of pied woodpeckers, were amongst the night arrivals; for two days a great grey shrike rested on the wires, darting down occasionally to reduce the insect population of the ridge, and a water-rail slunk along a drain as we passed. Predatory birds followed the migrating hosts and took toll. Along the ridge were many heaps of feathers where the merlin had dined; a peregrine was travelling with the redwings, and a rough-legged buzzard quartered the fields, passing within a few yards of where I lay to watch it.

Daily the swallows and martins coasted south, following the ridge; they never passed in large numbers, but the stream, though thin, was continuous. Occasionally a big party of starlings passed, flying with businesslike determination, not hawking from side to side and occasionally returning over the same ground for a few yards like the hirundines; the starling, whether bound for feeding-ground, for roost, or winter quarters, always means to get there with as little delay as possible. But the most noticeable migrants were the gulls, chiefly of two species, greater and lesser black-backs. There were black-headed gulls in the Humber, and some with common gulls following the plough; there were a few herring-gulls about, but the numbers of these species which were passing was trifling compared with the darker mantled brethren. Occasionally some of the larger gulls went out seaward to seek a shoal of fish, but as a rule all day and every day the stream steadily flowed south. How many thousands passed each day? Some travelled in irregular order, some in well-fanned chevrons, or in long lines, those to the rear benefiting by the air disturbance of the advance wings. At times only a dozen might be in sight at one moment; then party followed party in quick