Natural History 419 



and it is very easy to imagine words, for the conversation which 

 they keep up. The Goldfinch is perhaps the most beautiful of 

 all the feathered folk in the English landscape. In Autumn it 

 is a very pretty sight to see a little cluster of them feeding on 

 thistledown, and performing the most delicate acrobatic feats in 

 balancing themselves so as to pick it from the plant. 



A Few Woodlanders 



Variety of character in birds is nowhere more marked than 

 among the more familiar inhabitants of the woodland. Take the 

 Jay clean-made, bright-coloured, with a voice that is raucous 

 but seems always in tune with the noise which the wind makes 

 blowing through the tall trees. He is a gentleman in appear- 

 ance, but his flight is as awkward as the gait of a yokel. More- 

 over, Nature has endowed him with a thieving and lawless 

 character. He steals the eggs from the nest, and makes a meal of 

 any fledgings that he can lay hold of. Yet he is very cunning 

 about concealing himself during the breeding season, when he 

 has to think of the safety of the family as well as his own. For 

 the time being, the loud cry is stilled, and the bird, on being dis- 

 turbed, shifts slyly and quietly from one tree to another. He 

 has a natural genius for concealing his nest, and in that way 

 differs very much from his relative, the Magpie, whose idea of 

 architecture is simply to pile woody twigs upon woody twigs, 

 so as to make a conspicuous and monstrous habitation. The Mag- 

 pie used to be a favourite domestic pet, but its numbers have now 

 been greatly reduced, so that to see several of them together, 

 which used to be considered very unlucky, is almost impossible 

 in some districts. They very often go in threes, for some reason 

 which we cannot explain. The Magpie can be taught to articulate 

 a few words; he is inquisitive and loquacious. "The usual sound 

 emitted by the magpie is an excited chatter a note with a hard 

 percussive sound rapidly repeated half-a-dozen times. It may 

 be compared to the sound of a wooden rattle or to the bleating 



