TITS 107 



them. Within a dozen yards of this culvert a 

 pair of blue tits hatched their young in a hollow 

 cast-iron gate-post of the railway crossing, re- 

 gardless of the constant swinging of the wicket 

 gate by passers-by. 



The wren is another of our birds that faces 

 cheerfully our severest winters. Their well- 

 known habit of building several nests has led to 

 the belief that many of these serve merely for 

 winter shelters, and that those that are unlined 

 with feathers belong to this category. Gray, 

 however, mentions a series of six nests found by 

 him which were all unlined with feathers, and 

 yet all contained eggs. The wagtails, both the 

 pied and grey, leave us in winter, the former 

 being the first to return to the loch side in spring. 

 The meadow-pipit, the familiar 'moss-cheeper,' 

 is here as elsewhere doubtless the most common 

 victim of the cuckoo's unwelcome attentions ; a 

 much rarer bird with us is the tree-pipit, a 

 summer visitor that nests with us although but 

 sparsely. The spotted fly-catcher too is only 

 with us for a brief summer season ; but the 

 pretty little tree-creeper is content to stay, and 

 may be seen in mid-winter creeping mouse-like 

 in spirals up the stems of oak, birch and alder. 

 The swift is naturally confined to those localities 

 where there are buildings sufficiently lofty for 



