150 THE BIRDS OF SHERWOOD FOREST. 
filberts are made short work of, but several of the trees 
bear a large cob nut with a very thick shell, and into 
these they are sometimes puzzled to find an entrance. 
Two of the posts in the garden-fence were constantly 
resorted to in consequence of their being split, and in 
these cracks they fixed the nuts with great dexterity, 
and were thus enabled to break them with ease. A 
slight cavity in a fork of one of the trees was also used 
for the same purpose, and their loud hammering might 
be heard for a considerable distance. 
It is only on a tree that they are seen to full ad- 
vantage ; there they are perfectly at home; up or down 
the trunk they glide with equal facility, and rarely 
resort to the ground. I have seen them do so to pick 
up a nut they had let fall, but they appeared to move 
awkwardly on a flat surface, and flew back to the tree 
the moment the nut was secured. 
The nest of the nuthatch, if it can be called a nest, is 
always placed in a hollow tree, and is generally con- 
structed of dried leaves or moss very carelessly deposited. 
I took the eggs from one in 1854, which was composed 
of dry grass. The five eggs it contained were of the 
usual white, marked with brown; but in this instance 
they exhibited a singular gradation of colour, the egg 
which had apparently been first laid having the markings 
dark and numerous, each one of the others being less so, 
until the one which I consider was last deposited had 
only a few minute specks of pale brown, the glands 
which secrete the colouring matter having evidently be- 
come exhausted. I have remarked this gradation in 
colour in the eggs of other species. Those I have just 
mentioned were taken out of a hollow in a decayed oak 
tree, the entrance to which was only about six feet from 
