114 YELLOW-BREASTED BIRDS. 



Eggs. — 4-6, resembling those of the Sedge- Warbler, 

 grayish-white, softly mottled all over with ash and 

 yellowish-brown, and often having a few black hair- 

 lines at the larger end ; '78 x 56 inch (plate 126). 



Nest. — Of dry grass, root-fibres, and moss, plen- 

 tifully lined with hair and feathers, and placed 

 on the ground among meadow-grass, corn, or coarse 

 herbage. 



Distribution. — General throughout England, but 

 rare in the south-west; local in Wales; present 

 in southern Scotland ; in Ireland about the loughs 

 of Ulster and Connaught. 



The Yellow Wagtail is one of two yellow-breasted 

 Wagtails found in the British Islands, but is at once 

 distinguishable from the other — the Gray Wagtail — 

 by its olive upper parts, the head and back of the 

 Gray Wagtail being blue-gray. When it first arrives 

 in spring, the Yellow Wagtail consorts with Pied 

 Wagtails and Meadow-Pipits at the water-side, where 

 it runs nimbly (not hopping), with eccentric tackings 

 hither and thither as it snaps its insect-food from 

 the ground. When it rises it utters a double-noted 

 ' Wheet ! wheel ! ' and, flying fairly high with undulat- 

 ing flight and oft-repeated cry, may settle on the 

 hedge- top, a low branch of a tree, a taller stem in an 

 open field, or more commonly upon the ground itself. 

 It nests on the ground, often in some small hollow 

 among corn or grass, and at this time is mostiy to be 

 found in cultivated lands. Later it frequents the 

 meadows bordering streams, where it attends cattle 

 for the sake of the insects they disturb while grazing. 

 Its movements on the ground, where it is almost 



