496 PARID.E. 



rough bark of a Scotch fir, and prise them off with a jerk 

 which sends them to some distance. 



This bird makes its nest in holes in old willows, and 

 especially chooses those which, growing by the sides of streams 

 and rivers, are every few years polled : but other suitable trees 

 and rotten stumps are also used, and it has been known to 

 breed in a rat's hole in the ground. Montagu says he has 

 seen it artfully excavating the decayed part of a willow, and 

 carrying the chips in its bill to some distance, always work- 

 ing downwards, and making the bottom larger than the 

 entrance. The nest is generally placed on a bed of chips or 

 fragments of rotten wood, and consists of moss mixed with 

 willow-down and sometimes a little wool, felted together with 

 hair, especially rabbits' fur, the whole being often lined with 

 soft willow-down. The eggs are from five to eight in number, 

 measuring from *65 to *57 by from '49 to *46 in., white, 

 spotted with dull light-red, and generally have a more dingy 

 look than those of the other species. The call-note of 

 the Marsh- Titmouse is harsh and easily to be distinguished 

 from that of its congeners, sounding like the syllables " peh " 

 " peh " hoarsely pronounced, but the spring-notes of the 

 cock are varied, gay, and more musical. 



From Cornwall in the south-west, the Marsh-Titmouse 

 may be traced throughout all the counties of England and 

 the greater part of Wales ; but its distribution is certainly 

 local, and not entirely determined by the presence or 

 absence of marshy ground, for in Lincolnshire it is not of 

 common occurrence, though of late years, according to Mr. 

 Cordeaux, oftener met with than formerly. Some ornitho- 

 logists think that where this species is abundant the pre- 

 ceding is rare, and so conversely. This opinion, considering 

 the difference of their haunts, is very likely true, but it 

 may be remarked that in some localities each is to be found 

 in about equal numbers, neither being very common. In 

 Scotland its distribution is very partial, but ' it would seem 

 to occur throughout the eastern Lowlands, Lanarkshire and 

 Renfrewshire. It also inhabits the counties of Stirling, 

 Fife, Perth, Aberdeen and Inverness, in most of which it 



