C-2 HABITS OF BIRDS. 



other birds which roost in holes, the starlings huddle 

 closely together, contending for places ; a circum- 

 stance, indeed, recorded by Pliny. " As touching 

 sterlings," says he, " it is the property of the whole 

 kind of them to fly by troups, and in their flight to 

 gather round into a ring or ball, whiles every one of 

 them hath a desire to be in the middest*," a state- 

 ment corresponding exactly with what we have above 

 mentioned of the sparrows and bottle-tits. It is not 

 a little interesting thus to verify facts which were ob- 

 served by the ancients ; and Mr. Kriapp has done so 

 in the instance of the starling now under consider- 

 ation. *' There is something," he remarks, " singu- 

 larly curious and mysterious in the conduct of these 

 birds previous to their nightly retirement, by the va- 

 riety and intricacy of the evolutions they execute at 

 that time. They will form themselves, perhaps, into 

 a triangle, then shoot into a long pear -shaped figure, 

 expand like a sheet, wheel into a ball, as Pliny ob- 

 serves, each individual striving to get into the centre, 

 &c., with a promptitude more like parade movements 

 than the actions of birdsf." 



In the instance of the red-breast, the hedge-sparrow 

 (Accentor modularis, BECHSTEIN), and the wren 

 (Anorthura communis), one can scarcely imagine 

 how any of the species survive the winter, were it 

 only for the difficulty they must have in procuring 

 food. Selby, indeed, has observed wrens to perish 

 in severe winters, particularly when accompanied 

 with great falls of snow. " Under these circum- 

 stances," he says, " they retire for shelter into holes 

 of walls, and to the eaves of corn and hay-stacks ; 

 and I have frequently found the bodies of several 

 together in old nests, which they had entered for 

 additional warmth and protection during severe 



* Natural Historic, by P. Holland, p. 284, ed. 1634, 

 f Journal of a Naturalist, p. 195. 



