106 SPRING 



beaks on the warm May mornings. Some shaping of the 

 material with the breast is almost inevitable, if the bird is to 

 lie comfortably upon it and keep the eggs safe during three 

 weeks or more of incubation ; and from mere uneasy shiftings 

 and rollings it is an easy growth to deliberate brushing and 

 shaping with the softly rounded breast, which plays so large 

 a part in the construction of nests of the higher types. 



The first strong impulse to improvement in nest-building 

 arose when birds found it convenient to put their nurseries 

 in the branches of trees. The wood-pigeon's and turtle-dove's 

 nests are only scanty platforms of dry sticks and bents, lined 

 with a few roots ; but they mark a considerable advance in 

 structural skill on the mere mat of the stock-dove's and rock- 

 dove's nests, which are placed in holes, and perpetuate the 

 original family pattern. Slight as it looks, the wood-pigeon's 

 nest is firmly braced among the twigs, and is seldom forced 

 out by wind or the whipping of the boughs. Even the clumsy 

 wood-pigeon has learnt something of the art of wattling or 

 basket-making, which is employed by all birds that build 

 among boughs and form their nests of twigs and branches. 

 Nests of this kind are analogous to the wattled huts sup- 

 ported among the trunks of trees which are built by some 

 savage tribes. The strength of some of these wattled nests 

 is remarkable. A raven's nest built of old burnt heather 

 stems will cling together for many weeks even when torn 

 from its place and thrown among the waves on the strand of 

 a loch. A man of average weight can safely stand on a 

 crow's nest in the top of a tree ; and an old rook's or heron's 

 nest will often last for years in boughs exposed to every 

 storm. 



At some lucky moment it occurred to a bird wattling its 

 nest in the boughs to fix it by the use of mud. This was a 

 great convenience, and considerably increased the available 



