204 BRITISH BIRDS 



Dog-biscuit and "crissel'' are useful as articles of diet 

 for captive Thrushes, but even the latter requires supple- 

 menting largely with insect food — in a word, feed a 

 caged Thrush, as nearly as possible, on the lines on which 

 it would cater for itself in a state of freedom in its native 

 haunts, and it will do well. 



The nest of the Thrush is large in proportion to the 

 size of the bird that builds it ; it is composed of stalks 

 of grass and moss, very firmly cemented together with 

 mud, or, where this is unobtainable, with cow-dung; but as 

 the Thrush nearly always nests in the vicinity of water, 

 it is but seldom that the latter material is employed. 



The situation of the nest is various, but it is never 

 found exactly on the ground, although it is occasionally 

 met with hidden among the brambles or nettles, or even 

 long coarse grass on a sloping bank near the root of a 

 tree ; it is, however, more frequently placed on the lower 

 branches of the latter, or in a bush ; a standard fruit- 

 tree in a garden, for example, where the birds are pro- 

 tected, is a favourite site ; and a Thrush has been known 

 to make its nest against the side of an elm among some 

 young growth of twigs where a branch had been lopped 

 off quite twenty feet from the ground, while one has 

 also been known to build among the branches of a vine 

 in a conservatory, to which it obtained access through a 

 broken pane of glass. 



As a rule, there are two broods in the year ; the first 

 in April or May, or even in INIarch if the weather is mild, 

 and the second in May or June. The eggs, w^hich are of 

 a bluish-green colour, are sparingly speckled with large 

 and small spots of dark blackish-brown, and are usually 

 four or five in number, but somedmes as many as 

 six, and occasionally as few as three, but in the last 

 case it is probable that the bird had been previously 

 disturbed. Incubation, performed by the female alone, 

 lasts about fifteen days. The young are attended to by 

 both parents, and are chietiy fed with small green cater- 

 pillars, although, failing these, other insects, snails and 

 small white slugs, are had recourse to, as well as fruit of 

 various kinds. The young grow rapidly, and in from a 



