Ornithological and Other Oddities 



able cavity. The bird which built year after year 

 in a used letter-box at Rowfant is familiar to every 

 habitue of the bird gallery at the South Kensing- 

 ton Museum ; and I was once shown at Swanley 

 Horticultural College a great tit brooding peace- 

 fully in an old pump, and quite unmoved when 

 the top was taken off to allow of the view. I 

 have also known of a brood located in an old iron 

 pipe, some feet down. One would think that 

 tobogganing down on the brood and scrambling 

 up again every time attention had to be paid 

 them would be a game hardly worth the candle ; 

 but to an acrobatic nature like the oxeye's such 

 things seem trifling. One good point about this 

 cheerful acceptance of unfurnished lodgings on 

 the bird's part is that it is quite easy to induce 

 him to colonise one's garden, a firmly fixed water- 

 tight box, with an inch-wide hole in the front, 

 being all that is required. A brood reared about 

 the premises will get delightfully tame. Mr. 

 Sharp's young friends would freely enter his room 

 in search of food, thus almost emulating a captive 

 bird of this species I have been told of, which, 

 allowed the liberty of the kitchen, used to help 

 itself to whatever it fancied on the table, and 

 retire to rest in a jug on the dresser. But it is 

 as a subject for aviculture in the open that the 

 oxeye especially shines, and I can strongly advise 

 any one of my readers who does not as yet know 



him well to cultivate his acquaintance. 



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