DO STARLINGS PAIR FOR LIFE {" 237 



their mother into the house to be fed. The male 

 was wild and too shy ever to venture in. She noticed 

 the first year that it had a wing-feather which stuck 

 out, owing probably to a malformation of the socket. 

 Each year after the breeding season the male vanished, 

 the female remaining alone through the winter 

 months, but in spring the male came back — ^the 

 same bird with the unmistakable projecting wing- 

 feather. Yet it was certain that this bird had gone 

 quite away, otherwise he would have returned to 

 the garden, where there was food in abundance 

 during the spells of frosty weather. As he did not 

 appear it is probable that he migrated each autumn 

 to some warmer climate beyond the sea. 



I have noticed that wagtails, thrushes, blackbirds, 

 and some other species when the young are out of 

 the nest, divide the brood between male and female 

 and go different ways and spend the daylight hours 

 at a distance apart, each attending to the one or two 

 young birds in its charge. One winter, a few years 

 ago, I was staying for a few days at a cottage facing 

 Silchester Common, and on going out after break- 

 fast to feed the birds I particularly noticed a male 

 grey wagtail among those that came to me, on 

 account of its beauty and lameness. Every morning 

 I fed it, and on my speaking to my landlady about 

 it she said, " Oh, we know that bird well ; this is 

 the fourth winter it has spent with us, but it always 



