THE TITLING. 321 



names of some other birds, as ^-mice, tit-larka ; but it is 

 applicable pre-eminently to the bird under consideration, not 

 on account of its diminutive size, for, leaving the tail out of 

 the estimate, it is as large and heavy, and, from its thicker 

 plumage, it appears a larger bird than the wagtail; but 

 because of a very frequent habit, or rather, perhaps, misfor- 

 tune. The nest of the titling is one of those which the 

 cuckoo chooses for depositing its exposed egg. It shares that 

 burden with some other birds, especially with the meadow- 

 pipit, which has, on that account, been also called the " tit," 

 or "tit-lark.'* Both birds follow the cuckoo: it may be 

 sometimes from hostility, and sometimes in the character of 

 foster-mothers; at all events, they do it voluntarily, and 

 often blithely. It is the small following the great; and 

 " the cuckoo and the titling," or, better still, from the double 

 meaning of the first name, " the gotvJc and titling" of the 

 Scotch, has become not an uncharacteristic and, in some 

 instances, a very biting expression for the little of mankind 

 dancing a senseless and thankless attendance on the great. 



In form, the titling has some resemblance to the red- 

 breast, only it is larger, more lumpy, and not nearly so ener- 

 getic in its expression, or so lively in its motions. Its habits 

 are also a good deal similar to those of the red-breast ; it 

 comes about the farm-yards and cottages, and into the 

 gardens and shrubberies, in the inclement season, not in 

 flocks, but hopping about singly, and picking up any food, 

 whether animal or vegetable, it may find. In these gloomy 

 times, it utters its peevish cry with an apparent feeling of 

 suffering and desolation. If the weather is at all favourable, 

 these birds begin to sing about the middle of January, and 

 by the middle of February they pair, and retire to a greater 

 distance, though not so completely into the depths of the 

 woods as the redbreasts. Both birds labour at the nest, 

 which is composed externally of moss and vegetable fibres, 



VOL. I. y 



