Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 4 (1846).djvu/94

1260 Further on in Brabant and Hainaut the country becomes more wooded and hilly, and soon after entering the provinces of Namur, Liege, and Luxembourg, we find wild rocky heaths, and immense fo- rests which have never yet been traversed by man, and in which the wolf, the boar, and the roe-deer roam about in unmolested liberty. Here also run solitary rivers, whose steep and craggy banks are filled with ivy-grown chinks and crevices, which seem to invite the wild- bird to come and nestle in them, promising them safety from the as- saults of all their enemies. In other parts again are to be found im- mense and unwholesome reedy swamps* and morasses interspersed with marshy woods and ponds, these also attract many species of wild- fowl which would otherwise never be seen in this neighbourhood.

It is easy to comprehend that in a country, of which the general features change so rapidly as they do here, no one man could observe with sufficient accuracy the numerous natural productions which occupy its surface and write anything like a complete natural history of them; each locality would need a persevering observer and de- scriber of its own, and the united efforts of many would alone be able to compose such a work. (This is being done for Britain in a perfect manner through the medium of ' The Zoologist ' and its numerous contributors). I only professed from the beginning, to furnish the readers of these lines with notes on the birds of Belgium, and I must beg their indulgence with regard to the incompleteness of these, both as regards facts and the number of species spoken of; but the sub- ject was a very difficult one, and I have been obliged in the course of these papers to make use, largely and often, of Mr. De Selys' judicious observations on the Belgian Fauna, I have however seldom failed to verify his assertions, which I in every instance found to be perfectly correct.

I have noticed two-hundred and sixty-eight species of birds in this country, of which fifty-four only are truly indigenous ; the re- maining two hundred and fourteen being either birds of passage or of accidental appearance ; of these, fifty-five come and nestle in spring and leave us in winter, twenty-seven pass the winter with us coming in autumn and leaving in spring ; sixty-two are regular migrants but neither nestle nor hybernate here, and seventy- one are of accidental or irregular appearance ; to this number may probably be added some twenty or thirty other species which will be discovered to occur occa- sionally on our coast or in our forests, and which have been found in neighbouring parts of France, Holland, or Germany.

I have been much flattered by the notice which has already been