20 THE ZOOLOGIST. 
the sallow, which the parent birds must have brought from some con- 
siderable distance, as no sallows are growing near the spot. The materials 
of which this nest was composed made it very conspicuous, and, what is 
more remarkable, the bird must have built it at a time when workmen were 
erecting an orchard house within a few yards of the bush; but we well 
know that birds as a rule are much tamer, so to speak, during nidification, 
than they are at any other time. I may remark that although these nests 
were built in the furze outside the garden, yet a much larger number were 
to be found within its boundaries, and these were constructed in almost any 
suitable place. The furze dwellers had possibly found the locality favour- 
able for food, but not wishing, or not being allowed, to inconvenience their 
neighbours by building in their midst, they had availed themselves of the 
nearest suitable situation. I have never found a Greeufinch’s nest in the 
furze upon the open heath, as I have those of the Linnet, and think the 
Greenfinch generally chooses a higher situation for its nest than the 
Linnet. As I had frequent opportunities of observing the Greenfinches in 
question, I may throw some little light upon “the time of day at which 
birds lay their eggs” (Zool. 2nd ser. 5115, 5161),' and I can quite believe 
that the late Dr. Saxby intended writing a.m. and not p.m. These green- 
finches always laid, as far as I was able to observe, in the morning, between 
7 and 12 o'clock, generally from 8 to 10. When a boy at school I well 
recollect finding the nest of a Goldfinch in a high hedge: it had previously 
been found by some of my school-mates, and each was anxious to obtain 
the first egg. Two or three consecutive mornings I rose soon after day- 
break, in anticipation of becoming the possessor of the much-coveted prize, 
ignorantly supposing that the bird laid during the night, or at very early 
morning. On the fourth morning an egg was laid between eight and nine 
o'clock, after I had waited some four or five hours for its appearance; I 
took this egg, and on the following morning the bird laid another about the 
same time, but she forsook the nest after the second egg was taken. One 
evening, in my rambles about the meadows, I came across the nest of a 
Reed Bunting containing two eggs ; the following morning, having to pass 
near the nest, and seeing a Cuckoo fly out somewhere near the spot, 
curiosity led me to look at the nest again, and I found that besides the two 
eggs of the previous evening, one of the Cuckoo's was therein. This was 
before ten o'clock, so I reasonably conjecture that the Cuckoo must have 
laid that morning.—G. B. Corin (Ringwood, Hants). 
Greoanious Hazirs or rue Lonevansp Owr.—I may add my mite 
to the observations of Messrs. Boyes and Gurney upon this subject (Zool. 
2nd ser. 5163) as follows :—A few seasons ago, during March, I visited the 
heaths in this neighbourhood for the capture of the moth called Pachyenemia 
hippocastanaria, and in a fir-wood through which I passed I had seen one 
or more of the Owls in question on several occasions. One evening in 
