148 Short Communications : — 



hard woody substance, are partially defective towards the apex 

 on each side, or consist of a soft texture easily pervious to the 

 bills of the titmice. Here, at the soft or imperfect apex of the 

 shell, these birds commence their attack, and peck out the 

 kernel to the utmost depth that their bills will reach. I have 

 frequently known the entire kernel completely scooped out by 

 the titmice, before the nut was ripe enough to fall from the 

 tree. On one large tree, with a good crop, scarcely a walnut 

 remained that had not been attacked by these birds, and more 

 or less eaten. I mention this circumstance merely as a fact 

 in natural history ; not by any means with a view to blacken 

 the character of the birds in question, a race which, I cannot 

 help thinking, is already more persecuted than it deserves 

 to be.* 



\_The RooJc, VI. 142. VII. 100.] — For a similar reason, 

 and with no unfriendly feeling towards the rooks, I may 

 state that they also have a relish for walnuts. I have seen 

 them settle on the trees, several in a party, and, plucking off 

 the nuts, fly away with them to a distance. Whether they 

 swallow the walnuts whole, or, as I rather suspect, stock 

 through the shell and extract the kernel, I cannot positively 

 say. One autumn I was rather at a loss how to account for 

 the number of walnuts, some in their green husks, and some 

 without, which were to be seen strewed on the walks under 

 the elm trees which the rooks occupy as their breeding-place 

 in the spring. Recollecting that the rooks occasionally plun- 

 dered the walnut trees, and also that a day seldom passed 

 without their reconnoitring their spring quarters, I was led to 



* Mr. Blyth has contributed a paper " On the British Tits" to the Field 

 Naturalises Magazine : it is published in the number for June, 1833, and 

 occupies more than seven pages, vol. i. 262 — 269. Have the names " cole 

 tit" and " cole mouse," which are ascribed to the Parus ater, been so 

 applied in expression of the blackness of the head, throat, and under side 

 of the neck of this species ? The synonymes, Parus atricapillus Brissouy 

 La petite charbonniere Buffon, and Mesange petite charbonniere Temminck, 

 seem to prove that they have ; and if they have, the prefix " cole" should 

 of course be spelled " .coal," analogously with " coaly hood," one of the 

 provincial names of the bullfinch (Pyrrhula vulgaris), — 



" The honours of whose ebon poll 

 Are brighter than the sleekest mole ; 



(His bosom of the hue 

 With which Aurora decks the skies, 

 When piping winds shall soon arise 



To sweep up all the dew.") Cowper. 



" Cole goose," one of the provincial names of the " great black cormo- 

 rant," is likewise, it is presumed, an erroneous spelling for coal goose. — 

 J.D. 



