Few of our poets have given the Missel Thrush any attention whatever in their verse, but one has done it justice in the following lines: “Whilst thou! the leader of the band, Fearless salut’st the opening year, Nor stay’st till blow the breezes bland That bid the tender leaves appear; But on some towering elm or pine Waving aloft thy dauntless wing Thou joy’st thy love notes wild to sing.” [Illustration: MISSEL THRUSH AT NEST.] This species sometimes imitates the notes of other birds, but not nearly to the same extent as its commoner relative, the Song Thrush, and renders them in such an undernote that they are difficult to hear on account of the singer not allowing the listener to approach very closely. The call note is a harsh, rattling kind of cry, which, lengthened a little, and uttered with greater vehemence, becomes the alarm. Although shy during the greater part of the year, this bird grows much bolder during the breeding season. I have known it build in a fruit tree within a few yards of the front door of a farmhouse, and have seen it attack a stuffed owl which had been placed near its nest, containing young ones, and knock it clean out of the tree. [Illustration: landscape with trees] =THE DIPPER.= [Illustration: thistle flowers] The earliest recollections of my old moorland home in Yorkshire are of rushing mountain torrents, swirling and gurgling round limestone boulders, beneath which I used to tickle the lively little brown trout, and of white-breasted Dippers flitting up and down. The Water Ouzel, as it is sometimes called, is not at all a sociable bird. It takes possession of some portion of a stream, often limited to a few hundred yards in length, and keeping more or less strictly to it will not allow any intruder of its own species to encroach upon its domain. In appearance it is by no means unlike a large black Wren with a snowy-white breast and chestnut under parts. It secures its food in the most wonderful manner when the fact is taken into consideration that the bird appears to be no more adapted to the methods it employs than a Song Thrush. Alighting on some stone in the middle of a rapid stream, it deliberately walks down into the water and swims along the bottom by a series of wing-beats, picking up and swallowing as it goes caddis worms, larvæ of flies, and small molluscs. On several occasions I have disturbed young Dippers in the nest when they were ready to fly, and have seen them one by one plunge into a deep, clear pool and progress just as if they were flying slowly and heavily along under water until they came to shore or were compelled to rise to the surface from exhaustion. The Dipper is a sweet singer, but the listener requires to be very close to the little vocalist before he is in a position thoroughly to appreciate the bird’s low, soft, warbling song, which, although of no great length, is practised even in the middle of winter.