BIBDS NESTS. 



181 



are white with red dots. The exception I allude to is the Long-tailed or 

 Bottle Tit, so called from the shape of its nest, which is exactly that 

 of a soda-water hottle, with an opening on the side, made of the same 

 materials as the other, mingled with a little white moss on the exterior; 

 this is generally found in hedges, and an elegant little structure it is, 

 usually containing twelve or fourteen eggs, which are white. 



Now, the Wren, as I have before observed, builds a very large nest, 

 which, from the situation she chooses for it, usually in the side of a 

 stack, or wadded wall of an outhouse, or interior of the roof, or eaves, is 

 necessarily covered in; and hence, when built, as it sometimes is, in bushes, 

 it preserves the same shape, although the necessity no longer exists. Thus 

 we see the palpable distinction between reason and instinct, which, although 

 it performs the greatest wonders, cannot adapt itself to circumstances. 

 The Wren's eggs are white with small reddish speckles, and generally 

 seven or eight in number ; this bird, as I have elsewhere observed, is very 

 prodigal of her labour in nest-building, for it is not uncommon for one pair 

 of these birds to erect five or six nests within a short distance of each 

 other; this has never been satisfactorily explained, but the most probable 

 supposition is, that it is a cunning artifice to divert the attention from the 

 true nest, which is seldom discovered. 



As the Wren builds in such situations as to render it expedient that 

 her nest should have a cover, so her relative with a golden crest, takes 

 the foliage of a horizontal spruce or cedar bough for her protection, and 

 makes an open nest, suspended by cordage formed of cobwebs, hair, moss, 

 fine twigs, roots, etc. This elegant little bird is no less elegant in its 

 arrangements, for the materials it collects are of the finest description, 

 moss, lichens, rabbits' fur, feathers, wool, all on a fine scale and beauti- 

 fully enwoven, so that her little dozen of cream-coloured pea-sized eggs 

 make a pretty picture. Now we might suppose that the Willow Wrens, 

 so analogous as they are to this bird in their mode of life, would choose 

 the air for their house, and not build on the ground, and cover in their 

 nests, with a small entrance on the side, so that the green moss and grasses 

 which they use mingle and confound themselves with the surrounding 

 herbage. Their eggs are universally white with red dots, those of the 

 Wood Wren being darkest and roundest. 



Wagtails use very light materials, such as fine grasses and feathers, 

 and build usually on the banks of fresh waters, and lay five or six white 

 eggs speckled with black, very like those of the House Sparrow, which 

 uses the same materials, but in a vast quantity, and covers in, preferring 

 the eaves of houses or overhanging boughs of trees. 



(To be continued.) 



