56 BIRDS OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 



eaves, and in dovecotes, or where the bird can find a con- 

 venient place for its purpose. The eggs are five or six in 

 number, of a greenish blue colour, mostly without, but 

 sometimes with, a few small black spots sparsely scattered 

 about the longer end. 



The young are easily reared on biscuit soaked in milk, 

 ants' eggs, meal worms, maggots, and other insects, and get 

 very tame, learning to repeat words and airs that are 

 whistled or played to them. 



The favourite food of the starling is the grub of the fly 

 known by the name of daddy-long-legs, which is so de- 

 structive in pasture lands, where it eats the roots of the 

 grass, and sometimes leaves the ground bare for acres ; for 

 when the roots have been destroyed, the blades, of course, 

 wither away ; and yet, because when di-iven by stress of 

 weather during the winter, this most useful bird picks up 

 a little corn from the stack-yards, he is remorselessly perse- 

 cuted in some parts, and a price is put i'«pon his head. 



There are two nests in the season, as a rule, and it is not 

 uncommon for white and cream-coloured or bufi* specimens 

 to be met with, which are generally shot or captured. In 

 the aviar^' these breed freely, but the young are usually of 

 the ordinary kind, which shows that albinism is not 

 necessarily hereditarj'. 



The starling is gifted with great powers of imitation, 

 which he exercises even in the wild state, but more especi- 

 ally in captivity, when he will learn to repeat not only. all 

 kinds of domestic sounds, such as coughing and sneezing, 

 sawing wood, pouring out water, etc., but he will learn to 

 say tolerably long sentences in a wonderfully natural 

 manner, so as to deceive persons unacquainted with his 

 talent. 



As the bill of this bird grows very fast, and is kept 

 ground down to a suitable length by constantly poking 



