938 KESTREN. 
had no mate that year. Last winter a male Kestrel pursued 
a small bird so resolutely as to dash through a window in one 
of the cottages here, and they brought the bird to me. I 
put him into the aviary with the hen bird, and they lived 
happily together all the summer, and built a nest or scratched 
a hole in the ground, and she laid five eggs, sat steadily, and 
brought off and reared two fine young ones.’ Some pairs of 
Kestrels seem to keep together throughout the winter. About 
the end of March is the period of nidification. The young 
are at first fed with insects, and with animal food as they 
progress towards maturity. They are hatched the latter end 
of April, or the beginning of May. 
The nest, which is placed in rocky cliffs on the sea-coast 
or elsewhere, is also, when it suits the purpose of the birds, 
built on trees; in fact quite as commonly as in the former 
situations; sometimes in the holes of trees or of banks, as also 
occasionally on ancient ruins; the towers of churches, even in 
towns and cities, both in the country and in London itself, 
also in dove-cotes. Sometimes the deserted nest of a Magpie, 
Raven, or Jackdaw, or some other of the Crow kind is made 
use of. When built in trees, the nest is composed of a few 
sticks and twigs, put together in a slovenly manner, and lined 
with a little hay, wool, or feathers. When placed on rocks, 
hardly any nest is compiled—a hollow in the bare rock or 
earth serving the purpose. Mr. Thompson mentions a curious 
fact of a single female Kestrel* having laid and sat on four 
eges of the natural colour, in April, 1848, after having been 
four years in confinement. 
The eggs, which are of an elliptical form, and four or 
five in number, sometimes as many as six—six young birds 
having been found in one nest,—are dingy white, reddish brown, 
or yellowish brown, more or less speckled or marbled over 
with darker and lighter specks or blots of the same. Mr. 
Yarrell says that the fifth egg has been known to weigh several 
grains less than either of those previously deposited, and it 
has also less colouring matter spread over the shell than the 
others; both effects probably occasioned by the temporary 
constitutional exhaustion the bird has sustained. In the 
‘Zoologist,’ page 2596, Mr. J. B. Ellman, of Rye, writes, ‘this 
year I received some eggs of the Kestrel, which were rather 
dirty; so after blowing them, I washed them in cold water, 
and much to my surprise the whole colour came off, leaving 
the eggs of a dirty yellow, speckled with drab. Not long after 
