BIRDS OF THE WAVE AND WOODLAND 31 



The blackbird and thrush are really two birds of very 

 dissimilar character : the same traps will not succeed as well 

 with one as with the other, nor is it so easy to rear the former 

 as the latter. Country people declare that the mothers poison 

 their young ones when caged, and a poet says : 



" The timid blackbird — she, that seen, 

 Will bear black poisonous berries to her nest, 

 Lest man should cage her darlings." 



Whatever foundation there may be for the belief, I found 

 that if I caged a nest of blackbirds (leaving- the cage in the 

 bush and the top open for the parents to go in and out), the 

 old birds would visit the nest, presumably with food, with 

 the greatest diligence, but the young birds would be dying 

 in two days. The thrushes kept their young ones alive. 



Where do our blackbirds go to ? They rear in nearly 

 every case two broods a year ; that is to say, there are every 

 year five times as many blackbirds as the year before. Ac- 

 cording to this, starting with a single pair, a garden ought to 

 have at the end of five years fourteen hundred, and at the end 

 of ten years, supposing that one half died each year, some- 

 thing over hvo luillion blackbirds. Or, supposing they only 

 rear one brood, there would be over seven thousand. Sup- 

 pose the cats eat six thousand, there would still be the pre- 

 posterous number of a thousand left. Where, then, I ask, do 

 all the blackbirds go ? It is quite certain that each pair, as a 



