40 



liis strains of delicious melody to guide his partner to 

 their Agapemone that is to be, it can easily be under- 

 stood that it is impossible for him to survive the 

 sudden shattering of all his hopes, not to speak of his 

 being immured in a filthy dungeon and deprived of 

 his natural food. 



It is to be hoped therefore that the readers of this 

 Magazine and their friends will not take part in any 

 such lamentable tragedy as the trapping of a Night- 

 ingale in the Spring, for the proverb tells us that it 

 is the opportunity that makes the thief, and if the 

 trappers were to find that there was no market for 

 their wares, they would not give themselves the trouble 

 to take the birds of which they could not dispose. 



The Nightingale is purely insectivorous in its 

 habits, feeding largely on small beetles which it cap- 

 tures in the woods and copses it frequents, and it is 

 useless to try and keep one of them in confinement on 

 artificial food for any length of time. A diet consisting 

 mainly of biscuit and dried yolk of egg will give the 

 Nightingale indigestion, and it is vain to expect music 

 from a dyspeptic minstrel. 



At the same time when a Nightingale is properly 

 dieted, which it can easily be with dried ants' eggs for 

 its staple food, it will sing lustily in the house for a 

 much longer period than it would in its wild state, and 

 be in perfect feather and condition, thus proving that 

 it is not only healthy but happy. It is usual to give 

 too many mealworms, three or four a day being enough 

 in my opinion, for although so dry and apparently 

 innutritions there is really a great deal of nourishment 

 in the dried ants' eggs of commerce, which are mostly 

 imported from Austria and the Tyrol. [Weight for 



