272 BIRD LIFE IN WILD WALES 



I never remember climbing a tree in quicker time, 

 and very shortly I made the wood ring again with a 

 loud view-halloa, which brought the other four up 

 " hell for leather." 



Here, then, was the Kite's home, built about 

 twenty-three feet up a rather slender ivied oak in a 

 fork where two fair-sized branches left the parent 

 stem. For a Kite's this nest was extremely small, 

 and unless the down had been observed or the bird 

 seen to leave it, might well have been passed, except 

 by the tiro, who climbs to anything and everything 

 in the shape of a nest. Indeed, the keeper had passed 

 it several times, and I well recollected having seen it 

 myself on April i8th, and having remarked that it 

 looked too small to be of any good ; though no 

 doubt the ivy growing round it made it look smaller 

 than it really was. It was of rather an oblong shape, 

 made of sticks (those of an oak) of varying length and 

 size, some rather bleached, and was a bulky structure 

 generally, but the cavity containing the eggs was 

 remarkably flat. The lining consisted of mats of 

 sheep and lamb's wool, about the size of my closed 

 hand, some of which protruded over the edge of the 

 nest, tufts of brown horsehair, rabbit's fleck, moss and 

 flakes of wool, whilst as adornment two largish pieces 

 of cream-coloured paper in which my lunch had been 

 wrapped, and which I had thrown down in the wood 

 on April i8th. These bits of paper were lying close 

 together, and by the side of the eggs. A thin, sharp 

 twig, belonging to the tree, oddly enough projected 

 through the lining of the nest, which I broke off, for 

 it was sticking into one of the eggs. These were two 



