429 BIRDS. OF SOMERSETSHIRE. 
however, occasionally taken in many parts of Eng- 
land in almost perfect summer plumage, both 
before its departure in the spring and on its return 
in the autumn. 
The food of the Knot consists of aquatic insects 
and the soft animals inhabiting bivalve-shells, small 
worms and larve.* It can be kept in confinement 
without much difficulty, and has been fattened for 
the market like the Ruff: it may be fed upon bread 
and milk, small worms and finely chopped raw meat. 
Meyer thinks it strange that the ease with which it 
can be kept in confinement has not been taken 
advantage of in order to obtain specimens of the 
eggs; but, from the appearance of some which I saw 
in the Zoological Gardens in June, I did not think 
it probable that they would lay, as they had not at 
that time, long after their usual period, attained 
their, summer or breeding, plumage, only a very few 
feathers having changed. I do not think it probable 
that birds regularly assuming a nuptial plumage in 
their wild state, and not doing so in confinement, 
will breed: the Linnet is perhaps a more easily 
observed example of this peculiarity. + 
But little seems to be known of the nesting habits 
* Yarrell, vol. ii., p. 57; Meyer’s ‘ British Birds,’ 
vol. v., p. 68. 
} See notes on Linnet, ante, p. 200. 
