336 PHILOMELA LUSCINIA. 



labourer sleeps securely, should hear, as I have very often, the 

 clear airs, the sweet descants, the natural rising and falling, 

 the doubling and redoubling of her voice, might well be lifted 

 above earth and say, ' Lord, what music hast thou provided 

 for the Saints in Heaven, when thou affordest bad men such 

 music on earth V " 



After the period at which the young are hatched, the Night- 

 ingale is seldom heard, and its song is exchanged for a low 

 hoarse note, supposed to be an expression of anxiety for its 

 young. Its nest, which I have never seen in situ, is said to be 

 frequently placed on the ground, but sometimes in shrubs ; and 

 according to Montagu is " made of dry leaves, generally of 

 the oak, and lined with dry grass." One now before me is 

 composed of slips of the inner bark of willow, mixed with 

 leaves of the lime and elm, and lined with fibrous roots, grass, 

 and a few hairs ; its external diameter five inches and a half, 

 its internal three, its depth three and a half. The eggs, which 

 are four or five in number, are of a regular oval form, some- 

 what pointed, nine and a half twelfths of an inch in length; 

 seven twelfths in their greatest breadth, glossy, and of a uniform 

 pale olive brown, often, however, tinged with greyish-blue, 

 especially at the small end. 



Young. — The young when fledged differ from the adult only 

 in having the feathers of the upper parts tipped with reddish- 

 yellow, and those on the lower margined with dusky. 



