HOUSE SPARROW. IO9 



Instances of affection displayed by these birds for 

 their young, and when caged, for their owners, are 

 very numerous. A large number of these are re- 

 lated by Morris in his British Birds. It is said that 

 when caged young with a song bird, such as the 

 Canary, the Sparrow will learn to imitate its notes. 

 The House Sparrow is very quarrelsome and pug- 

 nacious. It is a common sight to see two of them 

 after an exciting chase alight on a tree, when their 

 angry chattering attracts one by one all the other 

 Sparrows near, which come to look on and add to the 

 din with their harsh chirping till the light is over. 



Its nest is built in a great variety of situations. 

 Under the tiles, or in the gutterings and stack-pipes 

 of buildings, in holes of walls, or the thatched roofs of 

 barns and outhouses, in trees, in an ivy-wall, or in the 

 deserted nests of other birds ; even in the nest of a 

 Sparrowhawk the nest has been found. In the spring 

 of 1894 a nest was built under a carriage of the 

 district railway, supported by one of the cylinders in 

 which the gas is stored, and the young were reared 

 while touring round the city."^ 



The Sparrow commences to build very early, for 

 two or three broods are reared in the year. It is a 

 life-paired bird. When placed in a hole of a wall 

 or building, the nest is a very slovenly piece of work, 



* Perhaps the most remarkable situation on record was one 

 chosen by two Sparrows, which in 1885 built their nest on one 

 of the axle-tree boxes of a nine-pounder bronze gun at Wool- 

 wich Arsenal which was fired twice daily ; and in due time five 

 young Sparrows were hatched in spite of the noise caused by 

 the firing, which one would have supposed would have caused 

 the birds to desert for ever, and the recoil and vibration, which 

 one would think would have disturbed the eggs so much as to 

 render them unproductive. 



