ii6 A BOOK OF BIRDS 



When sitting the long tail is disposed of by turning it over the back, 

 so that beak and tail often poke out through the doorway at the same 

 time ! The capacity of this nursery is as wonderful as its structure, 

 since no less than sixteen youngsters have been found cuddled together 

 inside, though from seven to ten is the more usual number. 



FAMILY SITTID/E {Nuthatches) 



A near relative of the Titmice is the Nuthatch (Plate XXII. 

 fig. 9). This is a tolerably common bird in the south-east and centre 

 of England, wherever old timber abounds ; but in Scotland it is rare, 

 and in Ireland unknown. 



Like the Woodpeckers, it passes its whole life on tree-trunks, 

 running up and down with marvellous ease. As a nesting-place it 

 prefers some hole in tree-trunks, or branch, and at the bottom of the 

 cavity a bed of dry leaves is made, on which the eggs are laid. When 

 the entrance to the nursery is too large, the bird reduces it to the 

 desired size — a hole through which it can only just wriggle — by means 

 of mud. In autumn the Nuthatch feeds largely on hazel-nuts, which 

 it fixes in some crevice, and then proceeds to hammer with its bill till 

 the shell is broken ; hard seeds of many kinds are also eaten, while, 

 during a large part of the year, insects form a considerable portion 

 of its diet. 



FAMILY CERTHIID^ {Tree-creepers) 



The little Tree-creeper (Plate XXII. fig. 7) is another tree- 

 dweller. Like the Nuthatch, it climbs about over the trunks of large 

 trees, but in one point it differs conspicuously, and this is in the 

 form of its tail. In the Nuthatch this is short and soft ; in the Tree- 

 creeper, on the other hand, it is long, and composed of stiff-pointed 

 feathers like those of the Woodpecker. Since the Nuthatch uses its 

 beak as a hammer, after the fashion of a Woodpecker, and the Tree- 

 creeper does not, this curious difference is not easy to understand, 

 for the Woodpecker's tail is supposed to have developed as a support 

 to give weight and force to the hammering of the beak, a device which, 

 from what obtains in the Nuthatch, seems to be unnecessary. The 



