CHAPTER XXXIII NESTING HABITS 



I CANNOT conclude these hasty sketches without 

 remarking that few people are aware of the number- 

 less subjects of interest and observation to be found 

 in the habitsand structure ofthecommonestbirds and 

 animals, which pass before our eyes every day of our lives. 

 How perfectly are all these adapted to their respective 

 modes of living and feeding. In every garden and shrub- 

 bery the naturalist finds amusement in watching its living 

 tenants. Look at the chaffinch, how it adapts the colour 

 and even the shape of its nest to the spot in which it is 

 placed, covering the outside with materials of the same 

 colour as the bark of the tree in which it is. So do also all 

 the other small birds. Again, they line their nests with mat- 

 erials of the same colour as their eggs. The chaffinch lines 

 it with wool and feathers mixed together, giving it a back- 

 ground of nearly the same hue as the shell of the eggs. The 

 greenfinch lines it with light-coloured feathers, collected 

 from the poultry-yard, as her eggs are nearly white. The 

 yellow-hammer has a greyish egg with stripy marks; she 

 lines her nest with horsehair. The robin's eggs beino- of a 

 reddish-brown, she makes use of dried grass and similar 

 substances. The prevailing colour of the hedge-sparrow's 

 nest is green, and her eggs are of a greenish- blue; and in 

 the same manner all our common and unregarded birds 

 adapt both the outside and the lining of their nests to the 

 colour of the surrounding substances and that of their own 

 eggs respectively. In the same manner they all have bills 

 adapted to the food on which they live — the grain-feeding 

 birds having short, strong mandibles, while those of the 

 insectivorous birds are longer and more slender, and as 

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