THE WALLERS. 105 



and the following inimitable passage from Richard 

 Jefferies will refresh every one who has witnessed 

 their performances : " He got up into the willow 

 from the hedge parsley somehow, without being seen 

 to climb or fly. Suddenly he crosses to the tops of 

 the hawthorn and immediately flings himself up into 

 the air a yard or two, his wings and ruffled crest 

 making a ragged outline ; jerk, jerk, jerk, as if it 

 were with the utmost difficulty he could keep even at 

 that height. He scolds and twitters and chirps, and 

 all at once sinks like a stone into the hedge, and out 

 of sight like a stone into a pond." 



All I have said above requires abatement if applied 

 to the Tailor Bird (Orthotomus sutorius), which is 

 nevertheless a Wren Warbler by nature and feature. 

 But it is a bird of some character and holds its tail up. 

 It is such a prominent feature of the bird life of our 

 gardens, that, if I cannot make it recognisable, these 

 pages may as well cease. But before describing it let 

 me remove a popular error by stating that the Tailor 

 Bird is not called by that name because it makes a 

 curious nest, nor because it comes out of an egg, nor 

 for any other senseless reason. More than twenty 

 years ago I was shown the cup-shaped nest of a Fly- 

 catcher, as a great curiosity, and was informed that 

 this was the nest of the famous Indian Tailor Bird. It 

 did not occur to my informant to ask why the maker of 

 that nest should be called a tailor rather than a potter 

 or a watchmaker ; and I have discovered since that his 

 kind is common. Therefore I take this opportunity 

 to explain that a Tailor Bird is called a Tailor Bird 

 because it sews. When its nesting time approaches, 

 which is during the monsoon, it searches fora shrub 



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