With the wants, however, of six children to attend to, she will betray less caution; both parents then look after the young, and they may be watched with comparative ease, as, having secured a luscious beakful of insects, spiders especially being a great delicacy, they hop or dart with their peculiar sharp flight from point to point, till finally they are gone, and on approaching the spot where they vanished, you will suddenly see them reappear from some hole or cranny. The young leave the nest as soon as they are able to hop and flutter, and are then jealously guarded by their parents, who fly round in great excitement if you approach too near. They are soon well on the wing, however, and the old birds are free to burden themselves with another family. During the early part of May, a large variety of the Wheatear may sometimes be seen, most frequently along the sea-shore; these are birds whose home is in the Far North, and which regularly pass through these islands at this time. They are larger and finer birds which have wintered in Africa and have remained on in Southern climes, refusing to be lured away when their English brethren left, but, judging their time as accurately as though possessed of the most reliable of calendars, they leave their tropical winter home when spring in temperate regions has well advanced. Not to be tempted by the attractions our country can offer in its most delightful month, they pursue their journey with restless energy to the apparently inhospitable shores of Greenland. These wanderers, however, do not concern us much; they are gone, and our summer residents are busy with their second brood, and when this is hatched, young and old spend the rest of the warm weather in their home; renewing their plumage, and preparing themselves for the shortening days of autumn, when they pass away to the sunny shores of the Mediterranean and to North Africa, though a few stragglers may possibly be found during the winter in some warm and sheltered nook of Cornwall or Devon. They have gone—October has brought the cold weather, trees are rapidly becoming bare—we go out one morning and find to our surprise that apparently our summer friend has returned; by the next morning he is gone again, and we realise that these passing birds had only stopped to rest before undertaking another night stage on their long journey from the Arctic. The male is grey on the head, neck, and back; wings black; rump, forehead, and superciliary streak white; lores and ear coverts black. Tail feathers, except the two central ones, which are black, white with broad black tips; underparts white, buffish on the throat and breast; under wing coverts mottled with dark grey and white. The female is brown on the back and ear coverts and much more buff below. The young are greyer and spotted above and below with buff. Length (of small race) 6 in.; wing 3·75 in.