HA RD WICKE' S SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



whilst ihat portion of the nest below its side entrance 

 descended into the mud nest of the swallow. 



The second nest of a swallow usurped by the 

 wren I found built against one of the beams 

 . supporting the ceiling of one of a group of deserted 

 thatched cottages which were being allowed to fall 

 into decay, the sashes having been removed from 

 the windows and thus allowing a free ingress to the 

 birds, which privilege the swallows had freely 

 availed themselves of, as many of their nests were to 

 be found within. This, too, was a nest of the season, 

 complete in the shell, the top of which was within a 

 couple of inches of the ceiling ; and it had evidently 

 been having its lining of hay and feathers put in by 

 its rightful owners when it had been unsurped by the 

 wren, whose domed nest (consisting of moss chiefly) 

 had been, as in the former case, built within the 

 open nest of the swallow, the dome being carried up 

 to the ceiling. As the date on which this compound 

 nest was found was so late as July 7th, it is not im- 

 probable that this, too, was a cock-nest of the wren, 

 and had been completed for some time before its 

 discovery. In the third instance, the wrens reared 

 a brood in the nest of the swallow which they had 

 usurped, or at least utilised, in the roof of an out- 

 building not a quarter of a mile distant from the 

 second nest recorded, and certainly not more than a 

 half mile from the site of the first, the site of the 

 second being intermediate : this third nest, however, 

 of which I had intimation, I failed to get to see ; but 

 I have no doubt whatever of the accuracy of the 

 account given me of it, though it is not impossible 

 that it may have been an old and deserted nest of 

 the swallow which the wrens had simply utilised as 

 a foundation upon which to erect their own edifice. 



With respect to the spare or cock nests of the 

 wren, the question arises. For what purpose are 

 they built ? Are they really built by the male bird 

 alone, as a shelter for himself during the nesting 

 season and possibly later on in the year? Or, are 

 they built by him simply because he is so full of life 

 and vigour that he must be busy, at a season when 

 there is a superabundance of food and the numerous 

 young have not yet been hatched to give both him- 

 self and partner labour sufficient in catering for their 

 appetites ? Or, is it possible that they are buik by 

 him prospectively for the accommodation of a 

 second brood after the first have been got oft", and 

 subject to the approval of mater? This, perhaps, 

 would account for their being discarded as unsuitable 

 in site or structure, and another nest more in 

 accordance with her tastes or requirements con- 

 structed. That this extra nest is, sometimes at least, 

 used by the wren as a place of shelter at night 

 towards the close of the year, I have had proof of; 

 since I have visited one such nest with a lantern 

 almost every night in the latter half of October 

 between the hours of nine and ten, and almost 

 invariably found a wren snugly ensconced within, and 



obviously much taken aback at having a bright light 

 shone full in upon it from the small rounded entrance 

 in the front of its very comfortable chamber. 



Pied wagtail {Motacilla lugiibris). — I have seen a 

 nest of this bird which had been built in an old nest 

 of the swallow, up in the roof of a " hemmel " (as 

 the open-fronted outbuildings for the retreat of the 

 grazing sheep and cattle are termed in the pastoral 

 districts of Northumberland) ; and it was composed 

 of an abundance of sheep's wool and hair, with a 

 little dry grass and a few fibrous roots, the whole 

 forming a dense lining to the utilised swallow's nest. 



In this nest the wagtails had successfully reared a 

 brood of young ; and in the last week in July, when 

 I examined the nest, it still contained some portions 

 of the egg-shells. Again, built in the straw laid up 

 in the skeleton loft of this same hemmel — a loft 

 formed by a few poles laid across the beams — I found, 

 on August I2th, another nest of the pied wagtail, 

 which contained well-grown young, and which were 

 probably a second nest and brood of the same pair of 

 birds as had already built and bred in the nest of the 

 swallow situate in the roof near by. 



Though speaking of the above nest of the swallow 

 as an old one, and probably simply utilised by the wag- 

 tail, it may still be considered as possibly usurped ; 

 for the swallow frequently uses its nest for more than 

 one season, raising the mud walls when necessary and 

 thus deepening it ; and the resident wagtail, which 

 breeds early, had probably taken possession before 

 the return of the swallows from their winter retreat in 

 the far south, and thus might have prevented these 

 birds from reoccupying their nest of a former season. 



The swallow {^Hirundo rusticd). — The nest of the 

 swallow, as I have noted it in our rural districts, is 

 usually built at a considerable elevation within farm 

 outhouses, sheds, and hemmels ; being built against 

 and adherent to the beams, couples and rafters, as 

 also other portions of the woodwork and stonework 

 of the roof ; though, of course, when a building is 

 low, the altitude at which hangs the nest is lessened ; 

 and in one instance which has come under my 

 observation, the distance was not more than three 

 feet from the ground. This lowly-hung nest was 

 attached to the side of a beam in the roof of an 

 occupied pigstye, and contained four eggs much in- 

 cubated ; the upper storey of this tiny outbuilding 

 was a hen-house ; hence the short beam or two in 

 the roof of the gloomy stye. A second swallow's 

 nest, built in the roof of an unused privy, was barely 

 six feet distant from the ground. A third nest, 

 taken on June i8th, 1881, was peculiar in the fact of 

 its having a lauter of four unincubated eggs lying on 

 their bed of hay and abundant soft fowl feathers ; 

 whilst beneath this thick warm lining was a second 

 consisting also of fine hay and a few feathers, upon 

 which lay two other eggs obviously of the present 

 season's laying, and which, on being blown, proved 

 to be quite fresh, the yolk of one of them only being a 



