486 EMBERIZID&. 
Both sexes of this bird endeavour to allure intruders 
from their nest. Mr. Salmon of Thetford says,* ‘ Walk- 
ing last sprmg amongst some rushes growing near a river, 
my attention was arrested by observing a Black-headed 
Bunting shuffling through the rushes, and trailing along 
the ground, as if one of her legs or wings were broken. I 
followed her to see the result ; and she, having led me to 
some considerable distance, took wing, no doubt much re- 
joiced on return to find her stratagems had been success- 
ful in preserving her young brood; although not in pre- 
venting the discovery of her nest, containing five young 
ones, which I found was placed, as usual, on the side of 
a hassock, or clump of grass almost screened from view by 
overhanging dead grass. JI have invariably found it 
in such a situation, and never suspended between reeds, 
as iS sometimes stated: it was composed of dead grass, 
and lined sparingly with hair.” 
Mr. Neville Wood, in his British Song Birds, relates an 
occurrence with the Black-headed Bunting which indicates 
a still higher grade of intellectual character. It is thus de- 
scribed :—“ Some years ago, when walking with a friend, 
I remember seeing two of these birds in an osier bed, the 
male perched erect at the summit of a willow stem, and 
his mate remaining beneath, or only occasionally coming 
within view. On our entering the osiers, they both flew 
around us in great alarm, mostly in silence, but sometimes 
uttering a low mournful kind of note, at the same time 
darting suddenly about the hedge and willow stems, as if 
impatient for our immediate departure ; and their manners 
were so different from those commonly observed in the 
species, that we were convinced that there must be a nest 
thereabouts. I was well aware of the difficulty of finding 
* Loudon’s Magazine of Natural History, vol. viii. p. 505, for the year 1835. 
