THE GRASSHOPPER WARBLER. 



209 



among the knotted and gnarled roots of an old ivy-covered thorn stump that still maintained 

 its place within a yard of a footpath. The nest is made of grass and leaves, and is of exceed- 

 ingly slight construction, so slight, indeed, that to r.-move it without damage is a very difficult 

 process, and requires the careful use of the hands. The eggs are generally four and some- 

 times five in number, and are of a peculiar smooth olive-brown, that distinguishes them at 

 once from the egg of other birds of the same size. 



The color of the Nightingale is a rich hair-brown upon the upper parts of the body, and 

 grayish-white below, the throat being of a lighter hue than the breast and abdomen. The 

 entire length of the bird rather exceeds six inches. 



GRASSHOPPER WARBLERS .—LocusteUa nm-ia, L JlunatUis, and L. Ivsdnioides. 



The little Grasshopper Warbler has earned its name by its very peculiar song, which 

 bears a singular resemblance to the cry of the grasshopper or the field cricket. It arrives in 

 the north some time in April, according to the weather, and leaves in September. 



Speaking of this bird, Mr. White, the naturalist of Selborne, says : " Nothing can be more 

 amusing than the whisper of this little bird, which seems to be close by, though at a hundred 

 yards' distance ; and when close at your ear is scarce louder than when a great way off. Had 

 I not been a little acquainted with insects, and known that the grasshopper kind is not yet 

 hatched, I should have hardly believed but that it had been a locusta whispering in the 

 bushes. The country people laugh when you tell them that it is the note of a bird. It is a 

 most artful creature, skulking in the thickest part of a bush, and will sing at a yard's dis- 

 tance, provided it be concealed. I was obliged to get a person to go on the other side of the 

 hedge where it haunted; and then it would run. creeping like a mouse before us for a hun- 

 dred yards together, through the bottom of the thorns ; yet it would not come into fair sight; 



Vol. n. 27. 



