RUDDY-BREASTED BIRDS. 97 



low branch, post, or rail he is given to frequent 

 bobbings of the head and flirtings of the tail ; but 

 whether on the ground or perching, in the pauses 

 of his movements he holds himself with a haughty 

 mien, observing with a fixed, sidelong glance of his 

 large, round, dark eye anything which may have 

 caught his attention. Except during the autumn 

 moult, he sings throughout the year a pure, varied 

 warbling, delivered with defiance when, in spring, 

 he contends with a rival ; but when, in winter, the 

 Robin, observed but unobserving, faces the dull, dead 

 days from leafless bough or frosted rail, the defiant 

 air is gone, and, withdrawn as it were into himself, 

 the bird soliloquises with a subdued simplicity in- 

 finitely sweet and sad, so that some have been known 

 to avoid him at such times. There is no ruddy - 

 breasted bird that sings throughout the year but 

 the Robin. Common notes of the Redbreast are an 

 incisive ' Tet ! ' repeated several times ; and a high- 

 pitched, complaining note, long-drawn and of piercing 

 tenuity. 



BEARDED TITMOUSE. Plate 43. 6| inches; 

 tail, 3i inches. Head b?ue-gray, with black mous- 

 taches ; upper parts and tail bright ruddy-brown, 

 with white pattern on the outer tail-feathers ; under 

 parts whitish, tinged with rose-colour on the throat 

 and breast; wings bright brown, patched with white 

 and black. Resident. 



Eggs. 5-7, glossy -white tinged with cream, 

 with a few fine wavy streaks of reddish-brown ; 

 7* '5 5 inch (plate 125). 





