FEATHERED RESIDKVTS IK THK GROUNDS OP TERRICK HOUSE. 99 



{Mmcicapa grisola,) even if the bird were not herself before us in confirmation 

 of the fact. 



As we are examining this nest, another bird passes out with a graceful 

 sweep from immediately above us, and, alternately rising and falling in curves, 

 alights on the margin of a neighbouring fishpond, where, with apparent unconcern 

 for the fate of the nest and eggs it has left, it forthwith commences running 

 down the different species of flies it may there find disporting themselves 

 in the sun. Having procured a short ladder, we mount to the place from 

 whence this bird was seen to issue, and there in some hole or corner, where 

 a brick or stone has been removed, either by the "hand of time" or the 

 fingers of man or boy, and thus enabled it to effect a safe and convenient 

 lodgment, we find its nest. This nest is rather rudely constructed, and 

 composed of rather rude materials to boot, having evidently been selected 

 from the manure heap in a neighbouring farm- yard; the lining consists of 

 cows' hair, wool, and bits of rag. The eggs, five or six in number, are rather 

 large for the size of the bird, which at first sight we could not fail to 

 recognise as the Pied Wagtail, {Motacilla Yarrellii;) they are of nearly a 

 white ground, freckled all over with bluish grey. Should the nest chance to 

 contain one rather larger than the rest, and differing from them more or less 

 in colour, we may without much risk of coming to an erroneous conclusion 

 set it down as the egg of the Cuckoo, (Guculus canorus.) I have in my 

 collection a nest of this species, (the Pied Wagtail, not the Cuckoo,) lined 

 throughout with well-washed snow-white dogs' hair, which gives it rather a 

 distingue appearance. It may be as well to state, for the special behoof of 

 the reader, that T. supplied the bird with this material myself, having placed 

 a quantity at her disposal about the head of the pollard ash on which the 

 nest was situated, so soon as I found the superstructure sufficiently advanced 

 for the purpose; this supply she readily availed herself of, without giving herself 

 the trouble of searching for any other. By adopting this or a similar plan 

 in reference to any other kind of bird, as the Goldfinch, Chaffinch, Hedge 

 Warbler, etc., you may generally succeed in obtaining a nest lined with any 

 desired colour. 



The Pied Wagtail chooses a variety of situations for the construction of 

 its nest, and places it at various degrees of elevation, sometimes even beneath 

 the surface of the earth; I have on several occasions found it underneath a 

 ploughed furrow on a stale fallow, and in a crack in the side of a newly- cut 

 I water-course. A pair produced an annual brood for several successive seasons 

 over a door which opened on^ to the leads at the top of a lofty house in which 

 I we resided a few years ago. Perhaps the most favourite situations are old 

 abridges and ruins, or stacks of haulm, peat, or faggots. 



Although the male of this species is not to be regarded as a Braham, a 

 , Mario, or a Sims Reeves among birds, it nevertheless has a sweetly-warbled 

 I song, which it gives while tripping with airy lightness over the dew-bespangled 

 ^lawn, along the roof of barn or dwelling-house, beside the margin of the lake. 



