72 THE ARCHITECTURE OF BIRDS. 
irregular sloping roof, and all the eaves of which are 
completely covered with nests, crowded one against 
another, and you will have atolerable accurate idea 
of these singular edifices. i 
*“‘ Hach individual nest is three or four inches in 
diameter, which is sufficient for the bird. But as 
they are all in contact with one another around the 
eaves, they appear to the eye to form but one build- 
ing, and’ are distinguishable from each other only by 
a little external aperture, which serves as an entrance 
to the nest; and even this is sometimes common to 
three different nests, one of which is situated at the 
bottom, and the other two at the sides. According 
to Paterson, the number of cells increasing in pro- 
portion to thé increase of inhabitants, the old ones 
become ‘streets of communication, formed by line 
and level.’ ”* 
CHAPTER VII. 
WEAVER AND TAILOR BIRDS. 
Tue captain of a ship, who had collected about 
torty birds from Madagascar, Senegal, and other 
parts of the African coast, brought to France two 
of the weaver orioles (Ploceus textor, Cuvisr), 
which he called Senegal chaffinches, and which are 
the only individuals we believe hitherto described 
by naturalists. They appeared to be of different 
ages, the elder having a kind of crown, which ap- 
peared in sunlight of a glossy golden-brown col- 
our; but at the autumnal moult this disappeared, 
leaving the head of a yellow colour, though its 
golden brown was always renewed in the spring of 
* Vaillant’s Trav., 2d series, vol. iii. 
