168 WHITE WAGTAIL. 
inside the window. In June he disappeared, but returned 
again for a short time, after an absence of a few weeks. The 
next year a pair, of which he probably was one, came again 
to the window, but did not advance any further. 
Its food a niiete of insects and their larve, and as these 
are procured, as may be gathered from the previous remarks, 
in every variety of situation, they are doubtless of as oreat 
variety of kinds. Many a “scarce article’ that would be a 
prize in the entomological cabinet, goes unheeded into the 
indiscriminating pouch of the insectivorous bird. 
The nest is generally placed in a hole of a bank or of a 
tree, higher or lower indifferently; sometimes under the eaves 
of a thatched house, or between the timbers of a roof, among 
felled wood, the roots that the earth may have fallen away 
from, a fee under a bridge, or in a heap of stones. 
Both birds assist in its formation, bringing together for the 
purpose small twigs and sticks, moss, grass, straws, leaves, 
and roots, and lining the whole with wool and hair. 
The eggs, which have little or no natural polish on them, 
and are four or five, six or seven im number, are bluish white 
in colour, speckled all over with minute grey specks, and 
spotted with larger spots of brown, principally at the larger 
end; occasionally in the way of an irregular belt. 
Male; length, seven inches and a quarter: bill, black; iris, 
black; forehead and sides of the head, white; crown, black; 
neck on the sides, white; part of the nape, black; chin and 
throat, black, but not extending back to that of the nape, 
a white space being left between the two, which runs into 
the grey of the back; in the winter it becomes white, a 
crescent only of black being left on the breast. Breast, white, 
light grey on the sides; back, pale grey. The wings have 
the first, second, and third feathers nearly equal in length, 
the second rather the longest; greater and lesser wing coverts, 
black, edged with white; primaries, black, narrowly edged 
with white; tertiaries, black, rather more edged with white. 
The tail, which is very long, and the feathers narrow, has 
the eight middle ones black, the two outer ones white with 
a black stripe along the inner margin, and a small portion 
of the base also black: the end is rounded; upper tail coverts, 
black; under tail coverts, white; legs, toes, and claws, black. 
The female has less black on the head; the forehead is dull 
white; the crescent on the throat is dusky grey, and in the 
summer it spreads up to the under bill. The greater and 
