
BIRD-NESTING IN WOODS AND HEDGEROWS. 
Except the gold-crested wren, it is the smallest of British 
birds; at the same time, its frame is nearly buried in a mass of 
soft and bulky feathers, which are left loose and tufty, so that it 
seems to be muffled to the chin, the eyes and nostrils being 
nearly concealed by the bristly feathers at the base of the bill, 
while the tail is full six incheslong. In such spots as we have 
described, that is, in plantations and straggling birch and hazel 
woods overhanging a brook, the ‘long-tailed tit flits along the 
tops of the taller bushes, searching the leaves and twigs, restless 
and ever in motion, streaming along in undulating and rapid 
flight, in which it has been compared to a flying arrow or dart, 
to which its small body and long tail gives it the appearance. 
The nest has already been described; the foundation is laid 
in the cleft of a tree, after a careful examination of the situ- 
ation, and trying the hole they have chosen by flymg in and 
out again several times. The foundation is formed of moss; 
the walls are built up of small portions of lichens, white and 
grey, mixed with fine green moss, feathers, and the softer 
leaves of deciduous trees, intermixed and woven with wool and 
spider’s webs, giving them consistence by pressing the whole 
with their breast, and by turning themselves round repeatedly 
in all directions. They are very jealous at first at being 
watched, but soon get tame and accustomed to the observer ; 
the male bird watching on the branch of a tree, as close to the 
nest as possible, while the hen bird is building; when she has 
disposed of her contribution to the nest, the other goes in 
while she watches: when both have finished, they fly off to- 
gether to collect materials. Sometimes the nest is placed in the 
fork of a tree, a long pyriform, six inches long, formed exter- 
nally of lichens, bound together with blades of grass, downy 
filaments, and cotton threads, and lmed with feathers. In this 
nest they lay as many as a dozen of the smallest of eggs 
(fig. 6) of an oval form, rounded at the smaller end, and 
about half an inch long and five-twelfths broad, of a colour 
white, marked with numerous faint-red dots at the larger end. 
Pursumg our walk, we soon come across the nest of the 
Rosry-RepBReEastT ; for, although Robin is a very domesticated 
sort of fellow when the snow covers the ground, and even earlier 
in the season, when the wild flowers have faded and the trees m 
the woods become bare, and the evenings chilly,—with the first 
glimpse of spring he disappears from the haunts of men, be- 
taking himself to woods and thickets, where, doubtless, his 
pert, forward, and pugnacious character does not fail to exhibit 
° 3li 


