Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 4 (1900).djvu/525

Rh Yr Eifl to look at Carn Trer Ceiri, that wonderful ancient town of misty history, I came upon a pair of Ring-Ouzels carrying food; but a very long watch failed to reveal the exact place of their nest, which was either in thick bracken or a waste of grey rocks in the midst of it. The actions of the birds several times completely deceived me into making a descent on some spot, only to cause the birds to take up once more a commanding position, and resume their loud hard "tac tac tac." Late in the afternoon I heard a few wild whistling notes. Probably this group of mountains is the westernmost outpost of the Ring-Ouzel in Carnarvonshire, from which county it has been known since the days of Willughby and Ray. "It is frequent on the high mountains of Caernarvanshire and Merionydhshire, where they call it Mwyalchen y graig, quasi dicas, Merula rupicola" (Ray's 'Synopsis Methodica Avium,' 1713). Although Ray distinguishes between the Rock-Ouzel and the Ring-Ouzel, it is obvious that his description and Willughby's, to which he refers, applies to the latter. The Song-Thrush was common, and the Blackbird still more so; to be found at the base of the headlands as far as a few bushes extended. The Mistle-Thrush I saw two or three times near Pwllheli. Mr. Coward has also met with a few. The Wheatear is a common bird. On the mountains and headlands and islands, as well as in some spots along the lower coast, the shrill highly pitched "ece" or "ees," followed by several hard "tacs" or "tecs," was a familiar sound as the pair of Wheatears, accompanied by their full-grown brood, flitted on before me. The only birds which enlivened the dry, stony, barren (the season had been unusually dry) top of Carn Fadryn were a family of Wheatears. I only saw the Whinchat twice—once at Abersoch, and once in a low pass among the hills near Nauhoran. Mr. Coward has seen a few near Abersoch. The "seet seet seet" (high), "chuch" or "gurch," or "seet-gurch," of the Stonechat was to be heard in all suitable places—among the gorse along the sandhills, on the moorlands, mountain slopes, the headlands, and about the drier edges of the marshes. Evidently the soft climate of Lleyn enables this resident to increase as it never can when exposed to the severe winters of parts of England, or obliged to migrate. I saw one bird with the white on its wing unusually largely developed; so much so that, seen at a distance, the bird