212 BRITISH BIRDS 



The Coal or Cole Tit. 



The Coal Tit is much smaller than its relations, as 

 may be readily seen if a piece of suet or bacon-rind be 

 attached to a tree or a pole in the garden, for all the 

 Tits are directly attracted to the dainty, which they settle 

 on in turns, the Oxeye, as becomes his superior size, 

 taking the first bite; when he has had enough the Blue 

 Tit appears upon the scene ; to be followed by the little 

 Coal Tit, which will then be noticed in close proximity, 

 but afraid to come down, so long as the larger Blue Tit 

 is hanging on to the fat; but when he goes, down comes 

 the Coal at once, and the difference in size as well as in 

 appearance becomes at once apparent. 



The Great Tit. 



This bird, which is also called Oxeye, and very often 

 Black-cap, by the dealers, is a bold, fearless, handsome 

 bird, at least when unsoiled by the smoke of towns, the 

 outskirts of which he frequents in considerable numbers. 

 Measuring nearly 6 inches in length, of which the tail 

 accounts for 2\ inches, he has a conical, sharp-pointed 

 black bill, brown eyes, and lead-coloured legs and feet. 

 The head and throat are deep black, but the cheeks are 

 white; the back is greenish-olive, the rump ashen-grey, and 

 the breast and belly are yellowish-green, divided longi- 

 tudinally by a black line. 



The female is very like the male, but the dividing black 

 line of the breast is shorter, and her colouring generally 

 is duller, and this is noticeable in the young as well as 

 in adult specimens of the species. 



In their wild state the Tits feed about equally on insects 

 and seeds and berries, taking the first chiefly in summer 

 and the rest in autumn and winter, when insect food is 

 more difficult to find. They all get credit for doing an 

 immense amount of damage to trees by knocking off the 

 buds, but really they are among Nature's most accomplished 

 pruners, and the amount of buds they remove are as 

 nothing compared with those that the horticulturist him- 

 self destroys when he prunes his trees. It has been 



