Nidification of Birds. 11 
gence ; but the Jackdaws, which had commenced building in the steeples 
of St. Ann’s and St. Mary’s, two churches in the vicinity, pilfered the 
sticks they brought as fast as they were supplied, till, at last, the Rooks, 
wearied with fruitless exertions, deserted the spot, and sought a locality 
better adapted to their purposes, 
In the summer of 1823, a pair of Spotted Flycatchers built a nest ina 
sird-cage, which had been left, with the door open, suspended from the 
branch of an apple-tree, in the garden belonging to E. Turner, Esq., 
situated in the township of Crumpsall. In this nest the female laid three 
eggs, but forsook them in consequence of the repeated alarms she expe- 
rienved from the frequent visits of the younger branches of Mr. Turner’s 
family, who were attracted to the spot by the novelty and singularity of 
the occurrence. 
A pair of Chimney Swallows, in the summer of 1824, built a nest ina 
hole, from which a brick had fallen, under the eaves of a house at Crab- 
lane, in the chapelry of Blakeley. It consisted of a breastwork of mud, 
erected about two inches within the aperture, leaving a space for entrance, 
and the interior was lined with hay and feathers. The female deposited 
and incubated her eggs in this nest, and the nestlings, when about half 
grown, by their pressure against the breastwork of mud, broke it down 
entirely. The parent birds, without attempting to re-build the breast- 
work thus injured, immediately began to construct another, rather lower 
than the former one, quite at the entrance of the hole ; affording their 
young, by this sagacious proceeding, a more ample space than they en- 
joyed before, combined with a much greater degree of security. 
The familiarity of the Redbreast is a matter of almost daily observation 
to those who are engaged in rural pursuits. In the month of June, 1825, 
a pair of these birds built a nest in a small saw-pit, situated in Crumpsall. 
Soon after the female had begun to sit, the sawing of timber was com- 
menced at this pit, and, though the persons employed continued their 
noisy occupation close to the nest every day during the hatching of the 
eggs and the rearing of the young, yet the old birds performed their seve- 
ral parental offices to their progeny without interruption, and apparently 
without alarm. 
Ornithologists are aware that House Sparrows frequently deprive the 
House Martins of their nests, and, fitting up the interior after their own 
