Sure there can be no doubt but that woodcocks and fieldfares leave
us in the spring, in order to cross the seas, and to retire to some
districts more suitable to the purpose of breeding. That the former
pair before they retire, and that the hens are forward with egg, I
myself, when I was a sportsman, have often experienced. It cannot
indeed be denied but that now and then we hear of a woodcock's
nest, or young birds, discovered in some part or other of this island:
but then they are always mentioned as rarities, and somewhat out
of the common course of things: but as to redwings and fieldfares,
no sportsman or naturalist has ever yet, that I could hear, pretended
to have found the nest or young of those species in any part of
these kingdoms. And I the more admire at this instance as
extraordinary, since, to all appearance, the same food in summer as
well as in winter might support them here which maintains their
congeners, the blackbirds and thrushes, did they choose to stay the
summer through. From hence it appears that it is not food alone
which determines some species of birds with regard to their stay or
departure.
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