"But this year I have seen not only not a single flock, but not even a single bird. One evening one of my daughters did indeed see a small flock of six, but even that small number only once. Whether it portends a very hard winter, or what the cause of it may be, I am utterly at a loss to know or even to guess. I quite miss this year the well-known cackle of the old gander as he has led the van of the flock that has followed him; now in a wide, now in a narrow, now in a short, now in a long wedge, over head, diverging just from the father of the family, or separating from time to time further back in the line. "I may add, as a possible prognostication of future weather, that fieldfares have, I think, been unusually numerous this year, as last year they were the contrary. I have also remarked that swallows took their departure this year more than ordinarily in a body, very few stragglers being subsequently seen." It will be sufficient to state that the mean temperature of January and February was below that of the same month in the preceding year, and that of March had not been so low for twenty years. The opinion that sea-birds come to land in order to avoid an approaching storm is stated to be erroneous; and the cause assigned is, that as the fish upon which the birds prey go deep into the water during storms, the birds come to land merely on account of the greater certainty of finding food there than out at sea. We add a few notes on Bird naturalists. The Redbreast has been called _the Naturalist's Barometer_. When on a summer evening, though it be unsettled and rainy, he sings cheerfully and sweetly on a lofty twig or housetop, it is an unerring promise of succeeding fine days. Sometimes, though the atmosphere be dry and warm, he may be seen melancholy chirping and brooding in a bush or low in a hedge; this promises the reverse. In the luxuriant forests of Brazil the Toucan may be heard rattling with his large hollow beak, as he sits on the outermost branches, calling in plaintive notes for rain.