MAGPIE. 247 



north, or in very alpine districts, where the ele- 

 vation becomes too great, and the forest range 

 too extended. Like its congeners, it would even 

 seem to delight in the vicinity of population, 

 perhaps in some degree attracted by the food 

 which is there presented to it, and the neighbour- 

 hood of villages, or the trees which generally 

 surround the farm steading, are almost sure to be 

 tenanted by a pair at least of these active birds. 

 There they station their nest, and a particular 

 tree year after year for that purpose is selected, 

 plantations and woods of limited extent being 

 also frequently chosen. Among all our native or 

 introduced trees, the ash is that most frequently 

 built upon ; there was an ancient law or regula- 

 tion in Scotland, whereby tenants were obliged to 

 plant and rear a certain number of ash trees round 

 the farm-steading, and accordingly most of those 

 sites are surrounded by some venerable trees of 

 this species on which the Pies love to build, and 

 the prevalence of this tree in such situations may 

 be the cause, without any particular partiality in 

 the birds existing for it. The nest is generally 

 placed high on a topmost branch, so weak as 

 scarcely to bear the weight of a boy ; but at other 

 times we have seen it placed at a moderate height 

 from the ground, in low shrubbery trees, in tall 

 overgrown hedges, and a gooseberry bush is in 

 one instance recorded as bearing the burden for 

 several years. The structure of the nest is very 

 different from that of the true Crows ; independent 

 of the usual cup-shaped nest, strongly built with 



