BIRDS OF THE WOODLANDS 105 



shelf of a bookcase in an upper room, the top of 

 a door, inside a broken lamp or stove, on a water- 

 ing-can hanging in a conservatory, on a battered 

 old hat fixed on a pea-stick as a scarecrow, and in 

 other places too numerous to mention. 



The eggs, four to five in number, are of a greenish- 

 white ground colour, thickly speckled and streaked 

 with red and rusty brown. 



The photograph gives a nesting site which may 

 be taken as typical. 



In plumage, the adult birds are of a uniform 

 olive-brown, the shades merging into a dull white 

 on the throat and breast. The size is a little over 

 five inches. In the young the back and wings are 

 spotted with much lighter hues. 



The Spotted Flycatcher is a summer visitor, 

 appearing in Great Britain in April and leaving in 

 September. 



This little bird, associated as it is with the sun- 

 shine and the flowers of happy English gardens, is 

 a general favourite. Unlike the Wood Wren and 

 many of the other warblers, which love to hide them- 

 selves in the verdure of the spring leaves, and whose 

 presence is often known only by their note, the 

 Spotted Flycatcher appears to delight in being con- 

 spicuous. Perched upon the back of the garden- 

 seat, on the post of a tennis net, on the railings 

 which skirt the lawn, or upon the single dead 

 branch which projects from the foliage of the oak, 

 he remains all through the long summer day about 

 the homestead. Ever and anon, he darts from his 

 coign of vantage, performs a graceful evolution in 

 the air, when the snap of his tiny beak may be heard 



