72 PENDTJLINE TIT. 



dimensions: — Height seventeen cents.; transverse diameter eleven cents.; 

 length of lobby three cents, and a half; diameter of opening three 

 cents.; thickness of edges fonr millemetres. It weighed fifty-five 

 grammes. Sometimes the lobby does not exist, and the nest then 

 takes the figure of a wallet, an egg, or a pear, nearly like that of 

 the Long-tailed Tit. 



The nest is attached and suspended with fibres of hemp, flax, nettles, 

 stalks of grasses, and even with little pieces of wool and the roots 

 of couch-grass. The length of the suspending rope varies very much. 

 M. Schintz has figured one, which was brought to me, in 1823, from 

 the neighbourhood of St. Gilles, (Gard.) by General de Fregeville. 

 It was suspended to an old aspen on the borders of the lesser Rhone, 

 by a cord four centimetres and a half long. 



Guettard has figured two nests of the Penduline, the cords of both 

 being finished by a sort of buckle which surrounds a small branch. 

 I have never seen this sort of fastening. Those I have observed were 

 always twisted round a bending branch, while both assisted in sup- 

 porting it as well as constituted a part of its structure. Thus suspended 

 by a flexible cord, this pretty little cradle is gently rocked above the 

 surface of the river or marsh, where the insects upon which the 

 Remitz feeds are found in abundance. The opening of the nest always 

 faces the marsh or river near which it is built. 



The nest is composed of tufts of thistles, dandelions, viper grass, 

 but above all the light and silken down which surrounds the catkins 

 of willows and poplars. There is also found in it horse-hair and 

 other animal materials, but only when vegetable substances are scarce. 

 I had a nest from the neighbourhood of Pezenas, which was almost 

 entirely composed of sheep's wool, and which had consequently a very 

 strong smell of the grease of that animal. 



Having brought together the materials necessary for its nest, the 

 Remitz interlaces them, felts them, gums them together, and thus 

 produces a sort of thick cloth, very close and firm. (It is in fact a 

 real cloth or felt.) This tissue is strengthened with the narrow leaves 

 of grasses, fibres, and rootlets, which sometimes stick out of the exte- 

 rior. Thus the framework is made. One of the nests figured by 

 Guettard has little bits of straw sticking out, of which the greater 

 part are worked into the texture. The Tits now arrange at the 

 bottom of the nest a small couch formed of down, feathers, and other 

 very soft materials. The colour of the nest is generally greyish or 

 whitish, according to the material of which it is made. Aldrovandi 

 and Thienemann have described nests with two openings, one before 

 and one behind; but in all the nests I have received I have only 

 noticed one entrance. 



