206 OBSERVATIONS ON A PATE OF BLACKBIRDS. 



think, account for their increased bulk after leaving the 

 shell. 



All went well with the young family until one fateful 

 morning when they were all four discovered dead and cold 

 at the foot of the laurustinus bush. 



The cause of this fatality is probably as follows : The 

 walnut tree hard by the nest forms the readiest means of 

 escape from the garden for a hunted cat, and when our 

 terrier's desires are thus baulked, he vents his disappoint- 

 ment in a quick succession of ear-piercing yelps and barks. 

 The evidence of witnesses went to prove that a cat used this 

 means of escape early that morning, and the dog was heard 

 to express himself in his usual style, and these sounds so 

 surprising, and so near, must have frightened* the young 

 birds, and in their efforts to fly away, their immature wings 

 failed them, and they fell heavily to the ground. 



One would have liked to have been able to report that the 

 natural affections of the parents were so harrowed by this 

 affecting circumstance that they drooped and pined away. 

 Nothing of the sort took place ; and though there may have 

 been a passing regret, the old birds consoled themselves by 

 blackbird philosophy, and that evening the cock was noticed 

 singing lustily from the roof of the greenhouse. It may 

 have been a funeral dirge, but it sounded uncommonl}" like 

 a carol. 



Shortly after this occurrence, the bereaved parents were 

 seen flying in and out of an ivy-covered wall which bounds 

 the garden on one side. They examined the whole length 

 most carefully, and a day or two afterwards commenced a 

 new nest on the very top of the wall, partly supported by 

 a spray of jasmine. This new situation, if not actually in a 

 main cat thoroughfare, was so near, and so easy of access by 

 any passing cat, that I put up a fence on either side to keep 



