Page:Bird Life Throughout the Year (Salter, 1913).djvu/240

166 the coast throughout the month, and the flocks of Dunlin are largely reinforced, many of the birds still showing the black breast of the breeding plumage. In fact, now that the ties of home and family are relaxed, a general shifting of quarters ensues, and through the next few weeks the night skies will be alive with bird-notes as the travellers call to their fellows, and myriads of tired wings will skim the waves of the misty Channel. But as successive departures thin the ranks of the summer birds, the arrivals of autumn and winter guests are so numerous that we scarcely mark our loss.

August is, and bids fair to remain, the great holiday month. Happily when we are able to turn our backs upon the madding crowd mountain turf is still fresh and springy, and the moors, so late to respond to the touch of spring, are crowned with the full glory of the heather. And what a choice lies open to us, even south of the Border. Shall we follow up the torrent as it rushes down from Llyn Llydau, hurrying on in fall and water-slide to the valley, till we see in front of us the sovran peak of Y Wyddfa, flanked on the left by the great precipices of Lliwedd and on the right by the lofty knife-edge of Crib Goch? Or shall we bear with the humours of Lake District weather, and watch