CROSSBILL. 1 97 



to keep it a prisoner, since it will busily ply its bill so as to 

 whittle away the bars and bend an ordinary wire. Still it is 

 by no means an impatient prisoner,* and is therefore often 

 kejDt in confinement. The principal bird-dealers in London 

 and other large towns are seldom without examples for sale. 

 Its flesh too is esteemed for the table, perhaps mostly by 

 those who cannot at the moment get a better viand, but in 

 many parts of the continent it is certainly in request, and 

 even in England it has been eaten with relish. 



The nidification of this species has been more or less 

 fully described by many writers, though it has fallen under 

 the observation of comparatively few ornithologists. For 

 three centuries and more the Crossbill has been known 

 to breed almost in the depth of winter or very early in 

 the year — " circa natalitla Christi " even, as an old author t 

 has it. But second broods are apparently not uncommonly 

 produced, or if not certain individuals must delay their 

 breeding-season for some months. Most of the nests observed 

 in these islands have been found in March or April, but 

 February is not too early nor May too late to look for them 

 when the birds by their constancy to some particular spot 

 give hope of their breeding there. Without being really 

 sociable it often happens that several pairs breed in propin- 

 quity. The nest is generally built on the horizontal bough 

 of a fir — though an apple-tree has also been recorded as a 

 site, at an elevation varying from five to forty feet, and nearly 

 always concealed by the foliage. In close woods, remarks 

 Mr. Hancock, where the lower branches have fallen off it is 

 necessarily placed high up, but where these (the trees having 

 room) are retained, they are not unfrequently preferred. 



The nest from the Holt Forest, exhibited in 1839 to the 

 Zoological Society {ut supra), was rather small in proportion 

 to the size of the bird, measuring externally only four inches 

 and a half across the top, and the cup but three inches in 

 diameter. The outside was strengthened by a few slender 



* It has been known to build a nest and lay eggs in the aviary at Audley End 

 as recorded by Mr. Clarke {loc. cit.). 



f Schwenckfeld, ' Theriotropheum Silesia;.' Lignicii : 1603, 4to, p. 263. 



