LESSER WHITETHROAT 



PLATE CXXV. 



Sylvia sylviella, . . . PENNANT. MONTAGU. 



Sylvia curruca, . . . TEMMINCK. 



Motacilla curruca, . . . LINN./EUS. 



Motacilla sylviella, . . . BEWICK. 



Curruca sylviella, . . . FLEMING. 



Curruca garrula, . . . GOULD. MACGILLIVRAY. 



THE nest of this regular migrant, which is begun 

 about three weeks after the arrival of the birds, is 

 of a slight construction, and is made of dry grass and a 

 little wool or moss, lined, but rarely, with small fibres, 

 roots, and hairs ; it is rather loosely interwoven, and is 

 bound together with spiders' webs and such like materials. 

 It is sometimes placed among the herbage on a bank, as 

 well as in the lower part of a hedge, or in some low 

 shrub a nut tree, gooseberry bush, blackthorn, broom, 

 woodbine, and among briers and brambles, generally at a 

 height, in the latter, of about four or five feet from the 

 ground, but sometimes as high as even ten. 



The eggs, five to six, exceedingly pretty, are of a 

 white or creamy white colour, spotted, most numerously 

 at the larger end, and sometimes in the way of a zone, 

 with small dots and patches of brown, olive brown, and 

 light grey. 



Incubation lasts from twelve to fourteen days, com- 



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