Perching Birds. 55 



The Blackcap [Sylvia atricapilla). This beautiful songster is distributed over 

 the greater part of England, Wales and Ireland in summer, but does not nest beyond 

 the south of Scotland, occurring in the northern parts of the latter kingdom on the 

 autumn migration. It extends throughout Europe in summer, as far east as the 

 Caucasus and Persia, and winters in North East Africa and Senegambia. 



The Blackcap's song is considered by many observers to equal that of the 

 Nightingale, and it certain!}' sings in a more sustained manner. The male takes his 

 share in hatching out the eggs, and my experience in the South of England is that he 

 is more often seen brooding than his red-capped mate, and the birds sit so close that 

 they are easy of observation. The nest is an extremely slight affair, made of dry 

 grass with a little moss, a few cobwebs, and sparsely lined with horse-hair. It is 

 placed in small bushes, such as wild-growing privet or brambles, sometimes among 

 the slender twigs of a small tree or among the dense ' growers' at the foot of an old elm, 

 where the accumulation of dead leaves helps to conceal it. The eggs are from four 

 to six in number, olive-brown or white, or salmon-pink in ground colour, varying 

 both in tint and markings to a remarkable degree, the spots and blotches being olive- 

 brown or grey or reddish-brown, with occasional black spots. 



This plain-plumaged little bird is also a beautiful songster, 

 THE GARDEN- ^^^ j^ much resembles the Blackcap in habits. It is, however, 



WARBLER. . , , , , . ,. , , • , , , , i 



,^ , . , . very simplv coloured, being olive-brown above, with the head or 



[Sylvia simplex.) j l ^ > n 



the same tint as the back, and the wings and tail also resembling 



the latter. The under parts are ochreous-buff, with the centre of the breast and 



abdomen greyish-white, and the under wing-coverts and axillaries orange-buft". 



This last character will generally distinguish the species. Young and old birds, after 



the autumn moult, are more russet brown and not so olive as in tlic breeding 



plumage. The Garden-Warbler is a summer visitor to Europe, extending to Western 



Siberia, and it winters in South Africa. It is found over the greater part of England, 



and nests in Southern Scotland, but becomes less frequent in our northern districts, 



and is rare and local in Ireland. 



The food of the species consists almost entirely of insects, but in the autumn it 

 frequents elder bushes along with the Blackcaps, and feeds on the berries. As a rule 

 it is a sh}' and retiring bird, and its song is only heard from the depths of the 

 thickets which it loves to frequent. Like the Blackcap, it makes a slight and artless 

 nest of dry grass and a few rootlets, with a little moss and a lining of horsehair. 

 Sometimes the nest is suspended in nettles, like a W'hitcthroat's, but at other times 

 it is built in the thin twigs of a blackberry or elder busli. The eggs are from four to 

 six in number, and resemble greatly those of the Blackcap, though the markings are, 

 as a rule, somewhat coarser. 



The Dartford Warbler (Melizophilns iDidatits). The present species is a dark- 

 coloured kind of Whitethroat with a longer tail than in these birds, the tail exceeding 

 the wing in length. The general colour is a dark slaty-grey, the under surface 



