TITMOUSE. 177 



the grand support of the soft-billed birds in winter is that 

 infinite profusion of aureliae of the lepidoptera ordo, which is 

 fastened to the twigs of trees and their trunks ; to the pales 

 and walls of gardens and buildings ; and is found in every 

 cranny and cleft of rock or rubbish, and even in the ground 

 itself. 



Every species of titmouse winters with us ; they have what 

 I call a kind of intermediate bill, between the hard and the 

 soft, between the Linnsean genera of fringilla and motacilla. 

 One species alone spends its whole time in the woods and 

 fields, never retreating for succour, in the severest seasons, to 

 houses and neighbourhoods, and that is the delicate long- 

 tailed titmouse,* which is almost as minute as the golden- 

 crowned wren : but the blue titmouse, or nun, (parus cceruleus^) 

 the cole-mouse, (parus ater^) the great black-headed titmouse, 

 (JringiUagOj) and the marsh titmouse, (parus palustris,') all 

 resort, at times, to buildings ; and in hard weather particu- 

 larly. The great titmouse, driven by stress of weather, much 

 frequents houses ; and, in deep snows, I have seen this bird, 

 while it hung with its back downwards, (to my no small delight 

 and admiration,) draw straws lengthwise from out the eaves 

 of thatched houses, in order to pull out the flies that were 

 concealed between them, and that in such numbers that they 

 quite defaced the thatch, and gave it a ragged appearance, f 



The blue titmouse, or nun, is a great frequenter of houses, 

 and a general devourer. Besides insects, it is very fond of 



have seen these birds feeding along with domestic poultry, during snow 

 storms, and even in frosty weather ; on which occasions they become very 

 tame. ED. 



* We have never heard of this beautiful little bird approaching the 

 habitations of man during storms, although its congeners are as familiar 

 as the robin during a hard winter, and will feed on bread, or other 

 farinaceous diet. In the severe spring of 1824, great numbers, of various 

 species, visited our grounds, and remained close to the house during the 

 time the snow lay, mixing and feeding with the poultry. We have more 

 than once seen a little hero of a blue titmouse disputing the right of a 

 hen to feed from the same dish with him. In Loudon's Magazine, a 

 correspondent says that this species destroys bees, " which it eifects by 

 rapping with its bill at the entrance of the hive, and killing the insects as 

 they come out. I was informed that a whole hive was in this manner 

 quickly destroyed. " ED. 



f Mr Gavin Inglis, of Strathendry Bleachfield, near Leslie, Fife, 

 informed us, that he saw sparrows similarly employed on the thatch of 

 one of his stacks ; and that, finding their efforts ineffectual when exerted 

 singly, they accomplished their end by uniting their strength, several 

 of them hung to one straw, and thus pulled it out. ED. 



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