190 RURAL BIRD LIFE. 



pause in his labours and listen to with delight. But 

 these concerts are soon no longer heard, for the males 

 have each gained the attentions of a mate, and by mutual 

 understanding the whole flock is disbanded. 



Let us follow one of the pairs, and bear them company 

 throughout the summer. They frequent their winter 

 haunt perhaps for a day or so after the flock have dis- 

 persed, and then high up in the air they wing their way, 

 twittering to each other as they go, to the higher lands. 

 There is a gorse covert below them, just on the borders 

 of a rugged moor, and with a peculiar dipping motion 

 they alight in its prickly fastness. Here for days, it may 

 be weeks, they frequent the covert, hopping from spray 

 to spray, the male bird singing with renewed vigour as 

 the vernal season expands its loveliness. But the birds 

 have a purpose in coming hither, and, prompted by 

 resistless impulse, they set about preparing for the 

 comforts of their future young. A convenient site is 

 soon chosen amongst the gorse, for the Linnet prefers it 

 to any other shrub, and a little home is speedily advanc- 

 ing to completion. In the first place, moss and dry 

 grass is used, sometimes strengthened with a i&^ of the 

 dead sprays of the gorse, and wool taken from its 

 branches, left there by the sheep in its struggles to pass 

 through the almost impenetrable mazes ; then the inside 

 is lined with hair, feathers, wool, and vegetable down. 

 But a few days are taken up in the erection of the nest, 

 and the first ^g^ is laid soon after its completion. Six 

 eggs are deposited, more rotund than those of the Green- 

 finch, and smaller, bluish-green in ground colour, speckled 

 with tiny markings of deep red. On these both birds 

 sit, though the female does so most frequently. Silence 

 is the protective power usually employed by the Linnet 

 for the safety of its nest, and you may sometimes 



