266 



The New Forest . its History and its Scefiery. 



hen, and two thrushes as provision for two nestlings. However, 

 there is always some compensation, for in one which I examined 

 were the skeletons of two snakes and a rat picked to the bone. 



The accompanying vignette will, I trust, although the nests 

 are so exactly alike, be of some interest. Whilst the artist 

 was sketching the honey-buzzard's nest, the old bird, the first 

 which T had noticed in 1862, made its appearance and circled 

 round the tree, uttering its peculiar short shrill squeak. This 

 nest, which had been repaired in the previous year, the dead 

 beech-leaves still hanging on to the twigs, was between forty 

 and fifty feet from the ground ; whilst that of the common 



CommoQ Buzzard's Nest 



Honoy-Buzzard's Nest. 



buzzard, who, whilst sitting, had, a month before, been killed, 

 was upwards of seventy feet, and placed on the very topmost 

 boughs of a beech, on which tree was also the other. 



But more important than even the nesting of the honey- 



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