USEFUL.
THE PIED FLYCATCHER.
The Wheatear.
(Saxicola œnánthé.)
This is a lively and vigilant bird. It selects a district, to which it afterwards remains faithful. It likes fallow ground, stony hollows, marsh-land, sandy depressions where there are undulations, also meadows where there are grass-grown mole-hills or grass plots. From one of these small eminences it surveys the surrounding land, and on seeing prey instantly makes for it, and having caught it flies on to another stone or hillock. It also perches on low posts, but only takes to a tree in case of need. As it prefers to be in the open, it is often visible, for when it begins to fly it spreads out its tail and the white feathers at once attract attention. It is a very useful bird, for it lives entirely upon grubs and insects. In autumn it destroys the caterpillars of the white cabbage butterfly. The modest little song is not heard only from the hillocks and stones on which it perches, but also high up in the air when wooing his bride with sweet sounds. It is fairly common in Hungary.
About the middle of March the Wheatear, with its graceful motions, begins to arrive in numbers on our own Southern and Eastern coasts. It flits over downs and fallow lands, some pairs remaining to make nests in old rabbit holes, and in sandy warrens near the coast, others passing on after a brief rest, seeking higher latitudes—the rocky moorlands of the Peak, the fallows of