46



nearly always built of reed-leaf and featlier ; but I have seen nests built of


litter and lined with fine grass.The fenmen who gather the


nestlings mow a circle round the nest before the eggs are hatched off, and

net the place with an old piece of herring lint; for the birds seldom build

over water, though the}' dearly love a hover that rises aud falls with the

tide, and perhaps that may account for their long nests. And when the

hatchings are a week old, the bird-catchers drop into the reed-jungle and

make a dash for the nest. The young birds tumble out like mice aud make

for the ground, and the fenmen catch them in the mowed space before they

have time to reach the protecting reed-brakes, and afterwards they are

reared by hand and kept as cage-birds, and they are wonderfully fast growing

birds. Indeed, the eggs are hatched in eight days and the young can fly in


a fortnight.In winter the Reed-pheasants gather together


in flocks, each numbering fifteen or twenty, and you may see them rise

from the reed on a bright winter’s day, chinging, flying up some yards into

the blue, and suddenly throwing themselves down headlong into the yellow

reed-bed to feast upon the insects therein. They are cheery companions to

the solitary reed-cutter as he works boot-deep in the icy water. He often

sees them run along the fallen amber stalks, moving like a Wagtail, with

tail held straight out behind, picking insects from the water. Aud the

fentnan knows they build close by, for they never wander far from the

place where they were bred and born.”


The extracts we have given show that Mr. Emerson has

no prejndice against keeping birds in captivity, and that he is

quite free from the cant aud sentiment on the subject with

which a good many writers on our native wild birds are afflidted.

“ Birds, Beasts, and Fishes ” is a book which we can heartily

recommend to our readers.



CORRESPONDENCE.


BREEDING GREY PARROTS.


Sir, — Plas any one of our Society ever bred Grey Parrots? If so,

would they kindly tell me how they set to work ? F. G. Dutton.


GOULDIAN FINCHES.


Sir, —Those of your readers who are interested in the charming

Gouldiau Finches, of both forms, may care to hear my experiences of the

past breeding season.


I turned out two pairs of Black-heads and one pair of Red-heads into

an uuheated garden aviary, on the 24th June, when they had almost

completed the moult, a few head and neck feathers only being in the blood.


One of the pairs of Black-heads had reared young last year in the

same aviary, which is well furnished with shrubs, and nest-boxes in the

covered portion. A cocoa-nut husk and a small wooden box were jaresently

occupied, and almost filled with dry grass bents, by the two pair of Black¬

heads. The lieu Redhead appeared delicate from the first, and later on,

died; while her mate, apparently without exciting any opposition, visited

both nests, and indeed, if I missed him, I could generally find him by

taking dowii one or other of the nest-boxes off its nail. As last year,

I noticed that the chief burden of incubation, and even of feeding the



