HOUSE-SPARROW. 65 



choice of a nesting-site is very various. The usual situation is under the 

 eaves., in the niches of masonry, in walls, amongst thatch, and in holes in 

 trees ; in fact the bird will take possession of any suitable hole in a wall or 

 pipe and there make its nest. 



The Sparrow chooses also other sites ; and in this particular we have 

 perhaps the most interesting part of its life-history. In addition "to the 

 clumsy, ill-made nest which the Sparrow always builds in holes, it fre- 

 quently constructs a well-made domed nest in a tree. It is probable that 

 the birds which build domed nests always breed in trees, and that the habit is 

 hereditary ; but some ornithologists have supposed that the Sparrow builds 

 in trees for the sake of coolness, and only in exceptionally hot weather. 

 Almost every kind of tree is selected, but evergreens are perhaps the most 

 frequently chosen. The nests are also often built amongst ivy, either 

 growing on walls or on tree-trunks. A more unusual breeding-place was 

 noticed by Dixon when in Skye ; he writes : " A fact worthy of note is 

 the breeding-place of this bird at Portree. In some few instances I found 

 their nests in the dense furze bushes by the roadside, within a few inches 

 of the ground. They were domed structures, like those the bird invariably 

 makes when in the branches of trees, and it was no uncommon thing to 

 see two in the same bush." The Sparrow also very often usurps the nest 

 of the House-Martin, or even that of the Barn- Swallow ; and it will fre- 

 quently build amongst the sticks of Rooks' nests ; and in the Dobrudscha 

 I saw the nest of an Egyptian Vulture containing two young half-fledged 

 birds, underneath which one or more Sparrows had built their nests, and 

 were hopping about amongst the sticks as unconcernedly as possible. It 

 also sometimes builds in the old nest of a Magpie. A Sparrow's nest in a 

 tree is a very different structure to a Sparrow's nest in a hole. In the 

 latter situation it is very loosely and slovenly put together, very often a 

 portion of the materials hanging out of the hole, attracting the attention of 

 every passer-by ; but in a tree it is globular and well woven, and the hole 

 which admits the parent birds is often so effectually concealed as to render 

 it necessary to pull the structure to pieces to get at the eggs within. Dry 

 grass and straws, intermixed with all kinds of rubbish, such as strips of 

 rags, twine, worsted, &c., form the outside, and it is always warmly lined 

 with a profusion of feathers, and sometimes masses of wool and hair. 



The eggs of the House-Sparrow vary from five to seven in number, and 

 are pale bluish white in ground-colour, more or less thickly blotched, 

 spotted, and speckled with dark brown, lilac, and greyish brown. They 

 vary considerably in size, shape, and colour. In some the ground- colour 

 is almost concealed by the rich brown markings, freckled and blotched 

 over the entire surface ; in others the spots are large and very bold, and 

 chiefly massed on the large end of the egg ; whilst many specimens are 

 scarcely distinguishable from those of the Pied Wagtail. They vary in 



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