170 THE COMMON SPARROW 



dried plants. The female lays four or five white eggs, speckled pai 

 ticularly towards the large end, with red. 



The season in which the bird-catchers usually take these birds, ia 

 during the months of June, July or August, or about Michaelmas. 

 They employ for this purpose limed twigs or clap-nets. If, when 

 caught, they be put into store-cages, and fed on any favorite seed for 

 two or three days, they will soon become tame. After this they may 

 be put into separate cages, and fed with rape or canary-seed. If it 

 be intended that the Linnet should imitate the notes of any other 

 bird, it ought to be taken from the nest when about ten days old. 



THE COMMON SPARROW. 



No bird is better known in every part of Great Britain than tbe 

 Sparrow. It is a very familiar bird, 

 but so crafty as not to be easily taken 

 in snares. In a wild state its note 

 is only a chirp: this arises, however, 

 not from want of powers, but from its 

 attending solely to the note of the 

 parent birds. A Sparrow, when 

 fledged, was taken from the nest, and 

 educated under a Linnet ; it also 

 heard, by accident, a Goldfinch ; and 

 its song was, in consequence, a mix- 

 ture of the two. 



Few birds are more execrated by the 

 farmers, and perhaps more unjustly 

 so, than Sparrows. It is true, they 

 do some injury in devouring corn; 

 but they are probably more useful 

 than noxious. Mr. Bradley, in his General Treatise on Husbandry and 

 Gardening, shows, that a pair of Sparrows, during the time they have 

 their young-ones to feed, destroy on an average, every week y about 

 three thousand three hundred and sixty Caterpillars. This calcula- 

 tion he founded upon actual observation. He discovered that the 

 two parents carried to the nest forty Caterpillars in an hour. He 

 supposed the Sparrows to enter the nest only during twelve hours 

 each day, which would cause a daily consumption of four hundred 

 and eighty Caterpillars; and this average gives three thousand tbree 

 hundred and sixty Caterpillars extirpated weekly from a garden. 

 But the utility of these birds is not limited to this circumstance 

 alone; for they likewise feed their young-ones with Butterflies and 

 other winged insects, each of which, if not destroyed, would be the 

 parent of hundreds of Caterpillars. 



Sparrows build early in the spring ; and generally form their nesta 

 under the eaves of houses, or in holes in the walls. But when such 

 convenient situations are not to be had, they build in trees a nest 

 bigger than a man's head, with an opening at the side. It is formed 



THE COMMON SPARROW. 



