146 BIRDS OF NORFOLK. 



itself filling up tlie only possible exit. The nest 

 appeared to be placed about six inches below the 

 entrance to it, but how supported could not be seen, 

 and in this place, in spite of every drawback, these little 

 creatures managed to hatch and bring off their young 

 ones in perfect safety. A white variety of this species 

 was observed, with others of the usual colour, at North- 

 repps, in January, 1848, an unusual occurrence with 

 these birds, which rarely vary in plumage. 



PARUS ATER, Linnseus. 



COAL TITMOUSE. 



This prettily marked species is commonly met with 

 throughout the year, though not so generally distributed 

 as the little blue-cap. In the fir-plantations it associates 

 at aU seasons with the little gold-crests, and in spring 

 is found as frequently in the beech and oak woods in 

 company with the willow- wrens. It frequents also our 

 gardens and shrubberies even in close vicinity to the 

 city, and occasionally, as Macgillivray observes, betakes 

 itself to the thickets of broom and gorse. The Coal Tit 

 mostly breeds in the holes of trees, but not far from the 

 ground; and Mr. Newton tells me that at Elveden he 

 has found them prefer a subterranean nursery, the nest 

 being placed a foot below the ground, amongst the 

 roots of an old stump cut level with the earth. Mr. 

 Hewitson also quotes a remark of the late Mr. Salmon, 

 that it has a ^^ great partiality for rabbits' fur, with 

 which it always lines its nest when in the neighbourhood 

 of a warren, and even when at a distance from one." 

 Mr. Blyth, in a most valuable paper "^On the British 

 Tits" (Field Naturalist, vol. i., p. 262), aUudes to 

 the habit in both the coal and marsh tits (as observed 



