MIDDLE OF MAY 55 
Many a time when walking by a stream I 
have seen this bird (to all intents a sparrow, 
were it not for its black head and mode of 
flight!) louping along from place to place 
as I have advanced, now on a reed, now 
on a blade of sedge, bending it nearly double 
by its weight, and the next moment on a 
may bush or blackthorn, and so on until at 
a bend in the stream, or a divergence of the 
path, my little friend and I have parted 
company. 
The nest on this occasion contained three 
purplish white eggs, streaked and spotted 
mith dark brown: ~.1t was built. of thin 
grasses, rushes and dried bits of hay, and 
lined with fine fibrous stalks and hair. We 
found this nest also by seeing the occupant 
fly out. The male bird kept flitting round 
on a privet bush close by, his mate not far 
away, quite silent, but in sad dismay. 
Then we saw a large white bird, quite a 
stranger in these parts. It might have been 
1 The black-headed bunting is often called the reed 
sparrow. 
