150 THE BIRDS OF SHERWOOD FOREST. 



filberts are made short work of, but several of the treeg 

 bear a large cob nut with a very thick shell, and into, 

 these they are sometimes puzzled to find an entrance. 

 Two of the posts in the garden -fence were constantly 

 resorted to in consequence of their being split, and in 

 these cracks they fixed the nuts with great dexterity, 

 and were thus enabled to break them with ease. A 

 slight cavity in a fork of one of the trees was also used 

 for the same purpose, and their loud hammering might 

 be heard for a considerable distance. 



It is only on a tree that they are seen to full ad- 

 vantage ; there they are perfectly at home ; up or down 

 the trunk they glide with equal facility, and rarely 

 resort to the ground. I have seen them do so to pick 

 up a nut they had let fall, but they appeared to move 

 awkwardly on a flat surface, and flew back to the tree 

 the moment the nut was secured. 



The nest of the nuthatch, if it can be called a nest, is 

 always placed in a hollow tree, and is generally con- 

 structed of dried leaves or moss very carelessly deposited. 

 I took the eggs from one in 1854, which was composed 

 of dry grass. The five eggs it contained were of the 

 usual white, marked with brown ; but in this instance 

 they exhibited a singular gradation of colour, the egg 

 which had apparently been first laid having the markings 

 dark and numerous, each one of the others being less so, 

 until the one which I consider was last deposited had 

 only a few minute specks of pale brown, the glands 

 which secrete the colouring matter having evidently be- 

 come exhausted. I have remarked this gradation in 

 colour in the eggs of other species. Those I have just 

 mentioned were taken out of a hollow in a decayed oak 

 tree, the entrance to which was only about six feet from 



