244. BRITISH BIRDS. [VOL, XI. 
_wool. various pieces of scrap linen, and lined with coconut 
fibre instead of the usual hair lining. 
Others were suspended two and a half feet from the ground © 
in cow-parsley and figwort, well concealed amongst very 
thick but not tangled growth of grasses and weeds, and were 
only one hundred and fifty yards apart, the male birds in 
each case singing incessantly about twenty yards from their 
nests. 
Yet another nest was suspended three feet from the ground 
from the lateral fork of a willow branch, and the male Warbler 
was singing vigorously right over the nest. 
In the choice of a site for its nest the Marsh-Warbler seems 
partial to the edges of trampled spaces, footpaths and cattle 
tracks through the herbage, and it appears to have no objection — 
to the site of its home being littered with old newspapers, 
paper bags and other rubbish left by picnic parties and 
trippers. 
The eggs are laid about the first week of June, and incuba- 
tion seldom begins until mid-June. Five eggs are the 
usual complement for the first sitting and normally one brood 
only is reared each season. 
If, however, the first nest is taken or destroyed by the 
cutting of grass and weeds in the withy-beds, a cultural 
operation which is usually done with bill-hooks about the 
time the birds begin to sit, a second nest will be commenced 
immediately very close to the site of the first, and a clutch 
of four eggs laid within a fortnight. If this nest too is 
destroyed, a third and even a fourth attempt will be made 
to rear a brood at intervals of a fortnight or less, though the 
third clutch will usually only contain three eggs. The 
Marsh-Warbler is very partial to one particular spot, and we 
have frequently noticed that the nest is built within a few 
yards of the site chosen the previous year. 
Marsh-Warbler’s eggs are very handsome and quite distinct. 
They are slightly larger than those of the Reed-Warbler. 
There are at least two distinct types of eggs. In the one, 
the ground colour is distinctly bluish, at times reaching — 
almost the intensity of the Bullfinch’s ege, which some eggs 
of this type somewhat closely resemble. The other extreme 
type is a dirty white or ash-grey ground colour, tantly tinged 
with blue. Both types are boldly and beautifwly marked 
principally at the large end of the egg with spots and blotches 
of purplish brown, and violet-grey, with lighter violet markings 
which often form a bold zone round the top of the egg. The 
centres of some of the darker spots are nearly black, whic’ 
give the eggs a very beautiful appearance. 

