162 SYLVIADjE. 



within two or three feet of his station. A pair of redbreasts that 

 were assiduously watched during their nidification in the conser- 

 vatory attached to the town- house of an acquaintance, were one 

 morning found in great consternation, in consequence of their 

 nest having been taken possession of by a bat, which they event- 

 ually compelled to change its quarters. The number of eggs is 

 not uncommonly five ; rarely more. 



Pour rather singular instances of the redbreast building within 

 doors near Belfast in the summer of 1833 here follow. In all of 

 them, shrubberies and plantations were quite near to the chosen 

 sites. The first two, communicated by a relative, occurred at 

 Wolf -hill. He observes : — " The two nests of a robin in the 

 carpenter's loft are placed on the corner of the wall supporting 

 the roof; the foundation that serves for both nests, is a quantity 

 of large wood-shavings, of which the sides of the nests are likewise 

 formed, together with green moss, beech leaves, wool, tufts of cow- 

 hair, &c, but they are lined with horse-hair only. The mass of mate- 

 rials of which these two nests are made, is about a foot and a half in 

 length, eight inches in breadth, and five inches in thickness. In wet 

 days the male bird kept much within the loft, and sang there. The 

 carpenter tells me that only one of them collected the leaves and 

 shavings : tins individual was known from its wanting the tail ; 

 it made very free with his pot of grease, and picked from it while in 

 his hand : a brood was reared in one of these nests, but two eggs 

 laid in the other were not incubated. On another occasion the 

 nest was built in the joist-hole of a wall, in course of erection, the 

 completion of which made the removal of the nest unavoidable, and 

 it was placed in an adjoining aperture of the same kind. The parent 

 bird after looking for some time about the spot where the nest 

 had been, rejoined her young, one of which was killed by falling 

 out of its domicile in the course of removal ; and here she did 

 not long remain undisturbed, as in the breaking out of a door 

 within a foot of the nest, the mortar and stones fell perilously near 

 her, but she nevertheless did not desert her young." 



At Fort William, the seat of a relative, the following circumstance 

 occurred. In a pantry, the window of which was kept open during 



