76 Bird-keeping. 



happy in confinement. Young birds may be reared 

 on bread soaked in hot milk, mealworms, ants' eggs, 

 and hard-boiled egg, but the parent birds will often 

 feed them in a cage hung near the spot where the nest 

 was. It should be treated like the Nightingale, but 

 should have plenty of elderberries and other fruit, flies 

 and insects occasionally, and requires abundance of 

 water for bathing, and fine gravel, of which it picks up 

 a good deal. The Whitethroat is subject to the same 

 diseases as the Blackcap, but does not suffer from cold 

 to the same degree, and lives longer in captivity. The 

 female has not the white throat which distinguishes 

 the male from the Fauvette. 



The LESSER WHITETHROAT (Sylvia curruca) 

 called also the Brake Warbler, Chatterer, and Ba- 

 billard is not so pleasing or brilliant in its song as 

 the Larger Whitethroat, which it much resembles in 

 plumage. It is supposed to be a very delicate bird, 

 and not to live long in confinement ; but Mr. Sweet 

 kept one for several years, and it became very tame, 

 and so attached to its cage that when the door was 

 left open it would fly out, and catch any flies or small 

 insects that came within its reach, but always returned 

 to its shelter ; and when the cage was put in the gar- 

 den it never ventured far from it. It would take a fly 

 from the hand, and drink milk out of a spoon. It 

 must be treated exactly in the same manner, and fed 

 on the same food, as the Greater Whitethroat. 



