The Starling. 191 



the Severn, their noise and stench being something 

 altogether unusual." 



Young starlings, until after their first moult, are 

 in colour utterly unlike their parents, their plumage 

 being of a dull brown. So unlike, in fact, are 

 they that such good observers as Montagu and 

 Bewick described and figured young starlings as 

 specimens of the " solitary thrush," though how 

 the mistake could have arisen it is hard to conceive, 

 as we should imagine that any boy who had ever 

 had an opportunity of bird's-nesting could have 

 identified the species. During the time they 

 remain in the nest the young birds are most 

 voracious, nothing apparently coming amiss to 

 them, and this voracity often leads to their 

 destruction, or at least captivity, as they are so 

 wanting in discrimination that even the human 

 finger is readily seized under the mistaken idea 

 that it can be swallowed and is good for food. 

 The wily boy, knowing this, is often enabled to 

 capture fledglings, whose nursery is far from his 

 reach in the depths of a hollow tree. The pro- 

 ceeding is a simple one ; he waits until he knows 

 that, the birds are nearly fledged, and therefore 

 strong and fit for his purpose, when inserting his 

 arm into the hole in which the nest is built, and 

 spreading his fingers, he, as a rule, finds at least 

 one of them seized, and is able, before the deluded 

 bird has time to discover its mistake, to drag out 

 his struggling victim. Starlings when taken from 

 the nest are not difficult birds to rear, and if 



