THE ARBOUR BIRD. 257 



I perceived then that it was a species with which I was un- 

 acquainted, and certainly not known as British. I was accord- 

 ingly not a little surprised when he told me it was the Sylvia 

 Hippolais of Bechstein, and astonished when he said it was one 

 of the finest song birds hi Europe, very superior to the black- 

 cap and fauvette, and in some respects even to the nightingale. 

 I thence concluded that it was the species whose splendid song 

 had charmed and puzzled me in an orchard at Schiedam, in 

 Holland, and again in the gardens of Prince Maximilian, at 

 Neuwied, on the Rhine ; the rich intonation and multitudinous 

 variety of the notes fully bearing out my friend's opinion. 

 This circumstance alone would go far to prove that the species 

 is not British, for it would be Impossible so fine a song bird 

 could be concealed, particularly as it haunts gardens, and is 

 rarely found in woods. The very contrary of the statement of 

 Temminck, whose authority, how high soever it may be in 

 other matters, is, with respect to habits and field observations, 

 of not the slightest weight : he might have seen the bird, if he 

 ever looked beyond his cabinet, in most of the gardens about 

 Leyden, where he resides. 



" I kept the old birds with their young, which they fed in 

 a cage for some time, but to my great regret they fell a sacri- 

 fice to the common enemy of cage birds. About the same time 

 I was delighted to find a nest of the same species in a lilac-tree 

 in my own garden, about half a dozen yards from my parlour 

 windows. Three of the young after leaving this nest were 

 secured, and their mother was caught to feed them, which she 

 did successfully, and I brought them all. and three others, 

 home with me to England. The nest was about seven feet 

 high from the garden level, and ten from the base of a low 

 wall, over which the branch where it was built leaned. The 

 workmanship of the nest is very superior to that of the black- 

 cap, coming nearer in character to that of the finches. The 

 frame- work is rather thick, made of dried grass stems, sewing 

 thread, fine wood shavings, birch bark, and small pieces of linen 

 rag. The inside is very neatly lined with roots, hair, and a 

 few feathers and small locks of wool. 



" In the full grown male the bill is about half an inch long, 

 straight, somewhat blunt, broad and flat at the base. The 

 upper mandible has an exceedingly indistinct notch, and is 



s 



