540 HOMES WITHOUT HANDS. 



you ; now on this side and now on that : so that, from these 

 manoeuvres of ventriloquism, you are utterly at a loss to ascer- 

 tain from what particular spot or quarter they proceed. If the 

 weather be mild and serene, with clear moonlight, he continues 

 pabbling in the same strange dialect, with very little intermission, 

 during the whole night, as if disputing with his own echoes. 



" While the female is sitting, the cries of the male are still 

 more loud and incessant. When once aware that you have seen 

 him, he is less solicitous to conceal himself, and will sometimes 

 mount up into the air, almost perpendicularly, with his legs 

 hanging, descending, as he rose, by repeated jerks, as if highly 

 irritated, or, as is vulgarly said, ' dancing mad.' All this noise 

 and gesticulation we must attribute to his extreme affection for 

 his mate and young ; and when we consider the great distance 

 from which in all probability he comes, the few young produced 

 at a time, and that seldom more than once in the season, we can 

 see the wisdom of Providence very manifestly in the ardency of 

 his passions." 



The nest which the bird defends with such skill and courage 

 is very well concealed in a dense thicket, and the bird is always 

 best pleased if it can find a bramble-bush thick in foliage and 

 well beset with thorns. Sometimes it is forced to content itself 

 with a vine or a cedar, and in any case it is seldom more than 

 four or five feet from the ground. The outer wall is made of 

 leaves, within which is a layer formed of the thin bark of the 

 grape-vine, and the lining is formed of dried grasses and fibrous 

 roots of plants. 



An allied bird, the Yellow-throated Chat {Vireo flavifrons, 

 makes a nest somewhat similar in materials, though not in 

 locality, to that of the preceding bird. It is usually fixed in the 

 horizontal branch of a tree or bush, and is made from the bark 

 of the grape-vine, moss, and lichens, and is lined with fine vege- 

 table fibres. 



Of our four British pigeons, two are branch-builders. The 

 Stockdove places its nest in holes in trees, in holes in the ground, 

 or on the tops of pollard oaks, willows, and similarly crippled 

 trees. The Eockdove makes its rude nest in the crevices of the 

 rocks which it frequents. . But the Eingdove and the Turtledove 

 are true branch-builders, and are therefore noticed in this place. 



