FELTING AND TAILORING 179 



they can be folded up without injury ; the entrance 

 is near the top, and they look more like little wash- 

 leather purses than anything one could imagine a 

 bird could make — in fact, with the exception of 

 some mud-nests presently to be described, they are 

 the most artificial-looking products of any form of 

 bird industry. 



The felted erect oval nest of our Long-tailed Tit 

 has been long and deservedly admired, but that of 

 the Cape Tit {Mgithalus capensis) is even more 

 remarkable, composed as it is completely of plant- 

 down, so closely felted that it is like cloth, and 

 provided with a tubular entrance, not at the 

 bottom, as in Weavers' nests, but near the top^ 

 Stark observed the hen closed this by pinching its 

 edges together when she left the nest, either to 

 keep the latter warm or to keep foes out, which 

 no doubt it would do, for at any rate he once saw 

 the mistress of the little house herself fail to get 

 in again easily. Under this vestibule is a little 

 pocket, in which the cock is supposed to sleep, and 

 very likely does. Tits generally sleeping in some 

 hole, or at any rate not on a perch in the usual 

 way. 



Besides weaving and the simpler process of felting, 

 birds occasionally practise sewing, though this form 

 of industry is rare. The best-known sewn nest 

 is that of the little olive-green Wren-like Warbler 

 called from this habit the Tailor-bird, and one 

 of the most common — and noisiest — inhabitants of 

 Indian gardens. The nest itself is simply the 



