se-bird, making the houses or cattle-pens its centre, and
remaining about them for months. There is not a farmhouse in the
South of England without its summer pair of wagtails--not more than
one pair, as a rule, for they are not gregarious till winter; but
considering that every farmhouse has its pair, their numbers must be
really large.

Where wheatears frequent, their return is very marked; they appear
suddenly in the gardens and open places, and cannot be overlooked.
Swallows return one by one at first, and we get used to them by
degrees. The wheatears seem to drop out of the night, and to be
showered down on the ground in the morning. A white bar on the tail
renders them conspicuous, for at that time much of the surface of
the earth is bare and dark. Naturally birds of the wildest and most
open country, they yet show no dread, but approach the houses
closely. They are local in their habits, or perhaps follow a broad
but well-defined route of migration; so that while common in one
place, they are rare in others. In two localities with which I am
familiar, and know every path, I never saw a wheatear. I heard of
them occasionally as passing over, but they were not birds of the
district. In Sussex, on the contrary, the wheatear is as regularly
seen as the blackbird; and in the spring and summer you cannot go
for a walk without finding them. They change their ground three
times: first, on arrival, they feed in the gardens and arable
fields; next, they go up on the hills; lastly, they return to the
coast, and frequent the extreme edge of the cliffs and the land by
the shore. Every bird has its different manner; I do not know how
else to express it. Now, the wheatears move in numbers, and yet not
in concert; in spring, perhaps twenty may be counted in sight at
once on the ground, feeding together and yet quite separate; just
opposite in manner to starlings, who feed side by side and rise and
fly as one. Every wheatear feeds by himself, a space between him and
his neighbour, dotted about, and yet they obviously have a certain
amount of mutual understanding: they recognize that they belong to
the same family, but maintain their individuality. On the hills in
their breeding season they act in the same way: each pair has a wide
piece of turf, sometimes many acres. But if you see one pair, it is
certain that other pairs are in the neighbourhood. In their
breeding-grounds they will not permit a man to approach so near as
when