NATURAL HISTORY OF SELBORNE. 73 



and down, and worry themselves ; they have not sense to get out 

 of the rut, and so they lie down and perish. Some say that they 

 die because they cannot get water ; they are mostly found dead 

 in numbers at the approach of autumn in hot, dry weather ; 

 they soon decompose after death. 



BLACKCAP, p. 93. This bird is also called the " mock nightin- 

 gale," and the " Norfolk nightingale," and is very easily kept in 

 confinement. These birds do well upon such food as bread 

 crumbs, bruised hempseed, and a little hard-boiled egg and 

 German paste mixed; they are long lived, and sing freely many 

 months in the year. Numbers are kept in confinement l>y 

 London fanciers. They are very common in Derbyshire, although 

 there are no nightingales there. Blackcaps do not mind the cold 

 and frostv weather, as they come as early as before the end of 

 March. When they first come they feed on ivy berries. In the 

 autumn they eat quantities of fruit, currants, pears, plums, c. 

 The Baroness Burdett Coutts has some large trees close to her 

 residence at Highgate which are covered with ivy. This ivy 

 produces an abundance of berries ; as a rule the blackcaps are 

 noticed feeding on the Baroness's ivy earlier than anywhere. 

 They are very close-feathered, hardy birds ; when freshly 

 caught, as a rule, few or none are lost, in " meating off." The 

 blackcap fattens upon ripe elder berries for the migration. 



From August up to the middle of September is the time when 

 all the London bird-catchers take large numbers of" soft meat" 1 

 birds, as they are then "clean moulted" and "meat off" much 

 easier. 



Mr. Napier writes : " The eggs of the blackcap are generally 

 a good deal smaller than those of the garden warbler. These 

 varieties very much resemble in colouring those of the blackcap ; 

 a most beautiful variety has the ground of a pale pinkish white, 

 clouded all over with rich reddish marks, with a few nearly black 

 spots. A third variety is white, with spots of ash and ochre, prin- 

 cipally gathered towards the large end, but without the nearly 

 black spots so general in the eggs of this bird. These black spots 

 are supposed by some zoologists to be the distinguishing mark 

 between the eggs of the garden warbler and the blackcap. The 

 nest of the blackcap is a loose structure, often formed of grass 

 or the stems of bedstraw or umbelliferous plants, and is usually 

 lined with hair. It is a summer visitor to Britain, and has 

 usually eggs (which are from ibur to five in number) about the 

 months of May and June." 



1 "Soft meat" birds are the insect-feeders. " Meating off" means inducing 

 the birds to take artificial food in captivity. 



VOL. II. L 



