f\ 



PREFACE. 



Their plumage dazzles not, but yet can sweeter 

 strains be heard? 



Let other feathers vaunt the dyes of deepest rainbow 

 flush, 



Give me old England's nightingale, its robin and 

 its thrush. COOK. 



DESPITE the fact that we live in a small 

 and thickly populated country, we are 

 singularly rich in song birds, thanks to 

 our numerous old furze-clad commons, 

 game preserves, and a healthy sentiment 

 in the great majority of rich and poor 

 alike towards the wee, feathered carol- 

 singers that make grove and hillside 

 ring with their sweet, happy music. 



This little book deals in a concise and 

 popular manner with the appearance, 

 haunts, habits, nests, eggs, songs, and 

 call notes of the winged melodists that 

 breed in various parts of the British 

 Islands. I have endeavoured to describe 

 them in such a way that the reader may 

 be able to identify them for himself or 

 herself in wood and field, and where two 

 species bear a similarity of appearance 



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