148 BIRDS OF NORFOLK. 



themselves were strewed about under the neighbouring 

 trees. I was quite at a loss to account for this, until 

 one morning I observed a marsh titmouse flying across 

 the grass-plot with a wliite ball, almost as big as his 

 head, on the point of his bill. He looked so oddly at the 

 moment I could scarcely at first sight determine either 

 the bird or its burthen, but as soon as he alighted on an 

 opposite tree he gave a little wrench with his beak, and 

 dropping the husk at the same time, flew off du-ect 

 to the snowberry bush. The whole thing was now 

 explamed, and as I watched, another titmouse joined the 

 first, and these continued as long as I had time to 

 wait carrying off the berries on the ends of their bills 

 to the same tree opposite, were they opened and dropped 

 the husks, then back again for more. On pickmg up 

 these husks afterwards, I found each of them split open 

 down the side, and minus the two little kidney-shaped 

 seeds that grow in either half of the white fruit. I have 

 often observed the coal, marsh, and blue tits at the same 

 time on some small firs in my garden, though scarcely 

 more than half a mile from the city, but the great 

 titmouse less frequently and for the most part in vdnter. 

 Mr. Gurney has known the nest of this bird to be placed 

 in a rat's hole, burrowed down into a closely mown 

 lawn. In the "Zoologist" for 1847, Messrs. Gurney and 

 Fisher refer to the great abundance of this species in 

 Norfolk, apparently occasioned by migratory arrivals, 

 whose departure was again noticed in the following 

 March. 



PARUS CAUDATUS, Linnaeus. 



LONG-TAILED TITMOUSE. 



Though so small and dehcate in appearance, this 

 beautiful and interesting species remains with us 



