340 INSECTI VOILE. 



that they are well worth looking for. That is best done with 

 a small pocket telescope, an instrument which no accurate 

 observer of the forms and actions of the smaller birds should 

 be without. By its means, the birds may be seen without 

 the least alarm or disturbance, and all the tints and markings 

 may be as well made out as if the bird were in the hand, at 

 the same time that it is showing all its attitudes with that 

 perfect freedom which alone can bring out its true character. 

 That applies to all birds, but more especially to those that 

 inhabit trees, and pass the greater part of their time in 

 hopping from twig to twig, and seldom come down to the 

 ground, or take long nights in the air. 



THE FIERY-CRESTED WREN (IRegulus igmcapillus). 



This species which, though by no means uncommon on the 

 continent of Europe, is a very recent addition to the known 

 birds of the British islands, is resident as well as the other; 

 and though it has hitherto been observed only in some parts 

 of England, as in Cambridgeshire and Sussex, it is in all pro- 

 bability pretty generally diffused, and may have, in many 

 instances, been confounded with the former. 



The discovery of it as a British bird is in itself rather a 

 curious matter, as the honour of it belongs to a cat, in the 

 possession of a gentleman at Swaffham. Puss and her 

 master are both fond of birds, though for different reasons, 

 no doubt ; but puss studies her master's interest as well as 

 her own, and affords another proof that the feline race are, 

 by a little attention, fit for other purposes than mere mous- 

 ing. The old prejudice, that "cats are attached to places 

 only," which, though a vulgar prejudice, is not of popular 

 origin, meets with contradiction every day. One would not 

 formally lay it down as a maxim, though in truth it has very 

 much the force of one, that "the more carnivorous any 

 animal is, it is the more gentle and docile if you only keep 

 its hunger satisfied." Even among men, beef-eaters are pro- 



