OUDEU PASSEKES. 541 



long threads of straw, flax, or wool, some of which going right 

 from one branch to another, form the edge of the nest in front, 

 and the others penetrating into the tissue of the nest, or 

 passing underneath and rolling over the opposite branch, give 

 solidity to the work. Between the exterior and interior, there 

 are moss, lichens, and other similar matters. The interior is 

 furnished with wool, spiders'-webs, the silky nests of cater- 

 pillars, and feathers, the whole united and tissued most inti- 

 mately and ingeniously together. 



The eggs are four or five in number, of a dirty white, 

 sprinkled with little spots of a blackish-brown, and more 

 numerous towards the thick end. Incubation lasts about one- 

 and-twenty days. 



The female has great attachment for the young family, and 

 shows considerable courage in defending it even against man. 

 Montbeillard says, that the father and mother have been seen 

 to dart courageously on those who were carrying off their 

 young ; and, what is still more rare, the mother has been 

 known, when taken with the nest, to continue hatching in the 

 cage, and die upon the eggs. 



These young birds are a long time before they can provide 

 for themselves ; and follow the father and mother a long time 

 before they can eat alone, with the cry of yo, yo, yo. Each 

 family assembles together to migrate. 



The song of the oriole is tolerably well known, and has 

 given rise to the different names imposed upon the bird, 

 according as the hearers have thought proper to express it, or 

 as they believed that they heard it. Some believe that it 

 always cries Yo, yo, yo, syllables which are always preceded 

 or followed by a sort of mewing, like that of a cat. Others 

 that it pronounces Oriot or Loriot. The absurd fancies of 

 the French have carried them pretty far in this point. Some 

 imagine that the bird cries compere loriot (gossip loriot) ; 

 many that it cries Louisat bonnes merises (Louisat, good black 

 cherries) ; and others have arrived at the very climax of 



