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buildings: it is made of grass, moss, hair and 

 feathers. The old birds are very attached to the 

 spot they have chosen for a nest, and are not easily 

 to be ejected: Hewitson mentions several curious 

 instances of this attachment : one such came under 

 my notice some little time ago. I found my gar- 

 dener hard at work picking at a hole in the garden- 

 wall : on going up to see what was the matter, 

 I found he was diligently trying to smash a Blue 

 Tit's eggs, and had great hopes of killing the old 

 bird on the nest by poking at it with a stick ; but, 

 luckily for the Tit, the hole was small and had a 

 turn in it, so he could not hurt the poor little bird, 

 who stuck most manfully to the nest, hissing like a 

 snake and fighting at the stick : as I would not 

 allow the gardener to pull down the wall the Tit got 

 the best of it, and brought up her brood, not quite 

 in peace, but in spite of numerous interruptions and 

 attacks on the part of the gardener against herself 

 and her young. 



The Blue Tit has the beak of a dark horn-colour, 

 almost black ; irides hazel ; forehead, a streak over 

 each eye passing to the nape, cheeks and ear-coverts 

 white ; crown of the head light blue ; a black streak 

 passes from the base of the upper mandible through 

 the eye to the nape ; a black streak also passes from 

 the under part of the lower mandible down the 

 centre of the throat, surrounds the white on the 

 cheeks and joins the streak through the eye and 



M3 



