Mr. H. T. Fletcher, who writes to Tuesday's Times,. from
Bicker, Lincolnshire, believes that those small birds which do not easily change their habitat have been grievously injured by the cold and wet seasons. " Of thrushes, blackbirds, Robins, and hedge-sparrows," he says, "I have found more dead birds during 1878 and 1879;than in the aggregate of twenty previous years." Also the ground vermin, like weasels, " which have been unusually numerous," have been driven by the deficiency of game to prey more on small birds. Among birds which vary their habi-. tat according to weather, he thinks that there has been no great destruction. He would have supposed that larks were very scarce, had he not recently seen a great flight of them travelling in a dense column, that must have comprised " thousaads in a minute," for a whole hour, in a southern and south-easterly direc- tion, in preparation for the recent spell of hard weather. Many have since returned to Lincolnshire, and only the golden-crested wren has, as yet, completely avoided his accustomed Lincoln-. shire haunts. If the golden-crested wren has deserted England altogether for the present, the golden-crested. wren is a sagacious as well as an attractive bird.
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