70 REDSTART. 



in 'The Zoologist,' page 355. Bishop Stanley mentions 

 one he had known 'built on the narrow space between 

 the gudgeons or narrow upright irons on which a garden 

 door was hung; the bottom of the nest, of course, 

 resting on the iron hinge, which must have shaken it 

 every time the door was opened. Nevertheless, there 

 she sat, in spite of all the inconvenience and publicity- 

 exposed as she was to all who were constantly passing 

 to and fro. Another has been known in like manner 

 to sit through the din of three looms at work from 

 five o'clock in the morning until ten at night, within 

 twelve feet of the nest. The same situation, if the birds 

 have been undisturbed, is frequently resorted to from 

 year to year. One pair have been known to revisit 

 the same garden for sixteen seasons in succession : a 

 pair resorted for four successive years to the ventilator 

 of a stable. The female is sedulously devoted to her 

 eggs or young, and will sometimes suffer herself to be 

 touched before flying off from the nest; if, however, 

 they be molested she will forsake it: both birds indeed 

 are most assiduous in their attentions to their brood, 

 one or other of them being to be seen in constant 

 motion, conveying food to them, or retiring in search 

 of it. In one instance, the male bird having been 

 killed while the hen was sitting, another partner joined 

 the widow, and became foster-father to the orphaned 

 family.' It has been known to lay its eggs in the nest 

 of a Titmouse. 



The following was in the 'Ipswich Journal' of June 

 nth., 1853: 'In the gardens at Holbrook House, the 

 residence of Miss Reade, a little bird called the Redtail 

 has built a nest in an inverted flower-pot, six and a 

 half inches deep, and seven inches wide at the top. 

 The hole in the bottom, or rather the top as the pot 



