EGGS AND EGG-COLLECTING. 31 
f THE MOOR-HEN. ? 
Tue eggs of this familiar and semi-domestic bird are from 
eight to ten in number, of a pale brownish-grey, spotted 
with umber-brown. This bird, like the duck, when leaving 
the nest covers her eggs with flags and reeds, of which also 
the nest is made. She builds among the sedges on the 
banks of streams and ponds, and sometimes in trees. 
Nests have often been found in willow-branches which 
touch and float upon the water. 
THE NIGHTINGALE. 
Tue eggs of this bird are from four to six in number, and 
are usually of a yellowish olive-brown colour, unspotted, 
but are occasionally found blue. Her nest is made of dried 
leaves, lined inside with fine grass. It is situated on the 
ground in woods and shrubberies, especially on the little 
banks at the foot of trees, under the shelter of ferns or 
weeds. 
J THE LAPWING. 
Tur Lapwing, or Green Plover, makes a very simple nest, 
only scratching a hole and lining it with bent or short 
grass. She generally makes it on a little knoll, so that it 
may be out of danger of being deluged, as her home is 
generally in swampy marshy land. She lays four eggs of a 
dirty-green ground, blotched all over with dark brown 
spots, and the colour harmonises so well with the ground, 
that it is sometimes very difficult for the collector to see 
them even when looking close to where they are. 
THE BARN OWL. 
Tue Barn Owl lays two eggs at a time, that is, lays two 
and hatches them, and lays again, even to a second and 
