Page:Bird Haunts and Nature Memories - Thomas Coward (Warne, 1922).pdf/74

46 Birds come and go; the watcher can never guess what he may see any morning, nor how many thousands have drifted by during the night unseen, unheard. The grey geese, in small skeins, passed at sea; ducks of many kinds floated by, or took flights close to the water; the first of the Brent geese was spotted by three or four gunners, but was intercepted on a water hole by one of the oldest inhabitants and his ancient muzzle-loader. On dark or foggy nights the southward flight of many individuals is checked by the dazzling rays from the lighthouse; even in November the list of casualties may number two or three hundred birds of a dozen different species; before me is one night's report when knots, redwings, fieldfares, blackbirds, starlings, lapwings, golden plovers, a rail, and a goldcrest struck in a fog. But the numbers slain at the lantern are as nothing when compared with the disaster caused by strong contrary winds. Dead goldcrests on the tide line were far too common, and some even reached land safely and perished from fatigue; it was almost possible to pick them from the bushes and marram when they first reached land.

Fatal, too, are the wires which run along the ridge. After a big arrival of knots we enjoyed knot pie, all our victims being unfortunates which were running about the sand and road with broken wings or other injuries. With a wind behind them birds would strike so violently that a wing would be torn off or both legs shattered; it was a kindness to end their pain, though the attendant hawks and the hooded crows did not leave them neglected for long.