FIRE-CRESTED WREN. -WREN. 79 



One is mentioned by Mr. JefFery, in his private uotes^ as 

 having been obtained at Fishbourne on the 21st of October, 

 1863. 



TROGLODYTID^, 



WREN. 



Troglodijiea par villus. 



This little bird, so often celebrated in our nursery-rhymes, 

 and in them so curiously associated with the Robin, may be 

 found in every part of the county, in the shrubbery, in the 

 fagot-stack, in the cow-house, and in all the outbuildings 

 of the garden or tlie farmyard ; and the fear of man seems 

 never to have been impressed on it. It may also be seen 

 among the furze of the South Downs, on the wildest heaths 

 of the open country, or in the closest hedgerows of the more 

 cultivated districts ; in fact, wherever it is likely to find a 

 chrysalis or a spider there is the Wren. Insects are un- 

 doubtedly its principal food, but I have myself seen it pick- 

 ing off and eating red currants, and, when a boy, have often 

 caught it in brick traps baited with nothing but Avheat, but 

 whether that was the object of its visit I cannot say. Con- 

 sidering the size of the performer, the loudness of its note 

 is perfectly astonishing, and I well remember being abso- 

 lutely startled by one of these birds suddenly bursting into 

 song as I was passing a fagot-stack at twelve o'clock on a 

 pitch-dark night, while I was walking with the patrol during 

 the agricultural riots of 1831, in the neighbourhood of 

 Chichester. 



Few birds vary more in their choice of a place to build in; 

 but perhaps the aforesaid outhouses may be mentioned as 



