It has been suggested that some of the sexually mature non-breeders may be actually enjoying their winter during our summer; in other words that they have bred in southern breeding-stations whilst their congeners wintered in the same zone. This means a double breeding-area for certain species--a possible explanation, but one hardly supported by known facts. When a bird had so cosmopolitan a range that in the course of its dispersal its breeding areas were separated, we almost invariably find that the birds inhabiting these two areas are distinguishable geographical forms or sub-species. Mr W. H. Hudson, in his "Naturalist in La Plata" refers to the godwit, _Limosa haemastica_, which spends the southern summer in La Plata and breeds in the north, and to birds of the same species which winter in La Plata, arriving from supposed breeding places to the south when the northern birds leave. Captain R. Crawshay, author of "The Birds of Tierra del Fuego," found it in this little known land, but speaks somewhat doubtfully of its identity; we shall probably learn that the southern form is sub-specifically distinct from the northern. There are other wide-ranging waders which are suspected of having a southern nesting area, but we still await proof. The lack of sufficient or suitable food in the winter home during our northern summer may also cause the exodus, but this is a difficult point to prove when it is remembered that the winter home of every bird is not the parched tropical land or the waterless desert. From some zones removal must be a necessity, but in others there is food for all, so far as man can tell. Dr J. A. Allen, a severe but discriminating critic of migration theorists, says--"Migration is the only manner in which a zoological vacuum in a country whose life-supporting capacity is a regular fluctuating quantity, can be filled by non-hibernating animals" (51). When in the early days of migration this periodically-supplied northern zoological vacuum was filled to overflowing by the increased numbers of avian inhabitants at the close of the breeding season, the natural food supply would be taxed to its limits; the falling temperature drove some and finally all to seek food further south, and their short migration to lands already filled with old and young birds, caused pressure and overcrowding further south. Further outward and usually southward movement was necessary and the zone of stress was gradually extended, though probably in those early days no particular species took long passages. The winter passed and the vacuum was again provided, and the rebound to fill it would create a slackening force all along the line; birds would spread from congested districts so soon as food supplying areas opened to receive them.