Birds’ Nests 
bler. With no positive difficulty, perhaps, in 
building at any height whatever, we should 
certainly expect every species to conform, in 
this respect, to its instinctive altitude. In this 
matter of location, it may also be observed that 
few if any of our species of trees have a system 
of branching that is more favorable for nest- 
support than the apple-tree; and no other kinds, 
moreover, are so plentiful around most of our 
country houses; which explains, I believe, 
better than any sentimental theory of fondness 
for human society, the frequency of nests 
around our homes. Nor do I suppose that 
the changed habits of barn, cliff, and white- 
breasted swallows, and of phcebes, in placing 
their nests on beams, or under eaves, or in arti- 
ficial bird-houses, instead of fastening them to 
sand-banks and rocks, as formerly, indicate 
anything more than a bit of pardonable laziness 
on their part, and a desire for a drier or firmer 
support than Nature furnishes. In the case of 
phcebes, the moss and lichens that still super- 
fluously decorate their abodes, when under the 
edge of a piazza, are a survival of their former 
precaution, when they fastened them to rocks 
and branches. 
Passing now from land to water birds, we 
147 
