[14]The song ceases about mid-June, and is not renewed till August: it is then usually so wanting in force as to be hardly recognizable. See [Note B]. at end of Volume.
[15]The spring of 1886 saw this hedge deserted by both species; the result of an outbreak of lawn-tennis in the adjoining field. They were lucky enough to find new quarters not far off.
[16]The scientific name is appropriate, viz. Sylvia rufa.
[17]Our Summer Migrants, p. 82.
[18]Mr. Courthope’s Paradise of Birds. No one who loves birds or poetry should fail to read Mr. Ruskin’s commentary on the chorus from which these lines are taken, in Love’s Meinie, p. 139 and foll.
[19]Unless it be in the westernmost branch, which runs at the foot of the Berkshire hills. Near Godstow the nest is to be found, as Mr. W. T. Arnold, of University Col., has kindly informed me: for obvious reasons I will not describe the spot.
[20]In the summer of 1886 this interesting bird was quite abundant in and round Oxford. If I am not mistaken a nest was built in the reeds of the fountain at the south end of the Botanic Garden, a perfectly secure spot. I heard the song there as late as the end of July.
[21]This bird cannot really be wholly missing in summer, but it is strange how seldom I have seen or heard it. It is wanting also from a list sent me by Mr. A. H. Macpherson, of birds noticed by him in Switzerland last summer (1886). But Anderegg tells me that its song is often heard near his house at Meiringen. The Missel-thrush is certainly more abundant.
[22]This name (Alpenlerche) seems to be applied by the peasantry both to this species and to the Alpine Accentor. Mr. Seebohm, in his British Birds, calls the former, very appropriately, the Alpine Pipit.
[23]E.g. on the rocks about the Devil’s Bridge near Andermatt, or on these of the Gemmi-pass.