198 sylviadjE. 



• 



composed of moss mixed with a kind of fine wool-like substance, 

 and lined with feathers ; the third, composed of similar materials, 

 was in a laurustinus and shaded by the leaves of the shrub : so 

 late as the l8th of July it contained four young. The three plants 

 just named, are favourite sites for the nest ; for which evergreen 

 shrubs and young coniferous trees are generally selected. The 

 gentleman first alluded to, once remarked, to his surprise, that the 

 eggs in a nest were placed regularly in two rows with the small 

 ends touching each other. On the 14th of April, 1848, earlier than 

 usual, a nest with eggs, was found near Belfast. Mr. Poole, 

 on the 16th of April, has observed a nest containing eight eggs. 

 Soon after the young can provide for themselves, they and their 

 parents flit about in company, and ring their little changes through- 

 out every plantation. In the first autumns that they thus came 

 under my observation, I was rather disposed, from hearing them 

 simultaneously everywhere around Belfast, to believe in a migra- 

 tion from the north (vide Selby's 111. Brit. Orn., vol. i. p. 230, 

 2nd ed.), but having subsequently heard them in different years 

 so early as the month of August, I now consider that it is our in- 

 digenous birds alone, which, by constantly uttering their little cries, 

 thus attract attention. These remarks were published in 1838, 

 in my series of papers in the Annals of Natural History, and it is 

 only to be added, that I consider the opinion then expressed still 

 correct as to the birds seen very early in the autumn, yet, on two 

 subsequent years, when the species came particularly under my 

 observation, I felt certain of a migration of these birds to the 

 neighbourhood of Belfast at the end of September and beginning 

 of October. All at once numbers then appeared, and their little 

 chorus was heard throughout a whole district, in a part of which 

 none were known to breed in the one year, and but a single nest 

 was observed in the other. Mr. Selby gives a most interesting 

 account of a great migration of these birds to Northumberland, 

 and adds, that before witnessing it, he " was convinced, from 

 the great and sudden increase of the species during the autumnal 

 and hyemal months, that our indigenous birds must be augmented 

 by a body of strangers making these shores their winter resort." 



