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the birds did not place it close down in the fork; other fringilline 

 species do; while many others, as some sparrows and towhees, 

 build on or very near the ground. 



All of the passerine birds, however, by no means build these 

 conventional nests, for many of the orioles, for example, con- 

 struct pendent, pouch-like affairs, with an opening at or near 

 the top, the structure, as a whole, hanging from the extremity 

 of the slender, waving twiglets of such trees as the willows, or 

 similar varieties where these do not occur. 



In Africa and India we meet with many genera and species of 

 small birds that have been familiarly called weaver birds from 

 the very fact that they do weave such ingenious as well as curi- 

 ous nests. For example, in the genus Euplectes, we find a bird 

 weaves a nest having the form of a chemist's retort. This is 

 swung at the extremities of the twigs of any willow-like tree in 

 such a manner that the globular portion is uppermost, while 

 the elongated neck just clears the water beneath. By such a 

 contrivance the eggs of this species are comparatively safe 

 against the attacks of monkeys and snakes. 



Still more remarkable are the nests of the sociable weavers, 

 birds which unite in a community of several hundreds, and in 

 some tree construct a common thatch roof, often as much as ten 

 feet square, under which they build their nests in common. An 

 entire chapter might be written upon the habits in this particu- 

 lar of this species, but the limitations of space forbids it in the 

 present connection. Related species to these African weavers 

 also make the most remarkable specimens of architecture. The 

 Bengal weaver bird also makes a purse-shaped nest, suspending 

 it over the water. Each year it weaves a new nest to this, at- 

 taching it below, so that in a few years a number of them are 

 strung together, giving the entire structure the appearance of a 

 cylinder of woven grass, with bulbous enlargements at various 

 intervals. 



Many of the warblers, the kinglets, the wrens, and others con- 

 struct wonderful nests. Our marsh wrens also make what are gen- 

 erally termed " cock nests," in which the birds do not lay, but 

 are built here and there about the real or occupied nest, appar- 

 ently with no other object than to deceive those searching for 

 their eggs. East India has its tailor bird (8. sutoria Lath. J, that 

 as a means of deception, actually sews with a thread the living 

 leaves about its pouch-like nest together in such a manner as to 

 completely conceal it. 



