THE SPOTTED FLYCATCHER 69 



and in contrast with its treatment of intruders when it 

 has chosen a more secluded spot for a home. A few days 

 after, I happened to be fly-fishing on the bank of a stream 

 close to which grew some tall elm-trees. Under one of 

 these I was pursuing my amusement, when a flycatcher 

 darted from a tree on the opposite side of the stream, and 

 flew so close to my face that to dip my head out of the 

 way was unavoidable. The same movement was repeated 

 again and again, making it impossible for me to persist.. 

 Suspecting that there was a nest somewhere very near me, 

 I looked up and discovered, within a few inches of my 

 head, a nest built against the boll of the tree, and contain- 

 ing four or five nearly fledged young ones, whose heads 

 and breasts projected considerably beyond the edge of 

 their mossy cradle. As I moved away, the parent bird 

 hopped about uneasily in a neighbouring tree, uttering its 

 monotonous and unmusical chirrup, but molested me no 

 further. It would seem then that the garden bird, grown 

 familiar with the human form, was unsuspicious of danger, 

 while the other, who had not been accustomed to see her 

 sanctuary approached, immediately took alarm. It is sup- 

 posed that the same birds are in the habit of returning 

 annually to their old resort. Both the above incidents 

 tend to give weight to this opinion : one of the birds 

 having been reared, probably in the garden, and so having 

 been accustomed to the sight of men from the first ; the 

 other having been always a recluse. The fact which fell 

 under my own notice, that a nest was built, and a brood 

 reared for three successive years in exactly the same spot, 

 is, I think, conclusive evidence that either the same birds 

 or their immediate descendants were the architects, it 

 being scarcely credible that three several pairs of birds 

 should have fixed on the same spot by accident. Mr. 

 Denham Weir has observed that the Spotted Flycatcher 

 consumes only a day and a half in the construction of its 

 nest, and that a pair of birds which he watched fed their 



