birds' eggs 65 



nest of one till long after the last drift had 

 disappeared from the fields, though a late writer 

 upon New England birds says the sparrow 

 sometimes lays in April, when snow is yet upon 

 the ground. 



The sparrow is not a beautiful bird except in 

 our afifections and associations, and its eggs are 

 not beautiful as eggs go, — four or five little 

 freckled spheres, that, like the bird itself, blend 

 well with the ground upon which they are 

 placed. 



The eggs of the "chippie," or social sparrow, 

 are probably the most beautiful of sparrow 

 eggs, being of a bright bluish green with a ring 

 of dark purple spots around the larger end. 



Generally there is but little relation between 

 the color of the bird and the color of its egg. 

 For the most part the eggs of birds that occupy 

 open, exposed nests are of some tint that har- 

 monizes well with the surroundings. With the 

 addition of specks of various hue they are ren- 

 dered still less conspicuous. The eggs of the 

 scarlet tanager are greenish blue, with faint 

 brown or purplish markings. The blackbird 

 lays a greenish blue egg also, with various 

 markings. Indeed, the favorite ground tint of 

 the birds that build open nests is a greenish 

 blue; sometimes the blue predominates, some- 

 times the green; while the eggs of birds that 

 build concealed nests, or lay in dark cavities, 

 are generally white, as is the case with the 

 eggs of all our woodpeckers, for instance. 

 The eggs of the bluebird are bluish white. 



