ment of a nest-building by this bird. He says that the female, 

 who seems to be generally the active builder, placed, in the 

 first instance, a bundle of fine grass in some conveniently- 

 forked branches, and after having picked it about for some 

 time, as if regularly shaking it up, she seated herself in the 

 middle of it, and there, spinning herself round and round, gave 

 it its cuplike form. She then fetched more grasses, and after 

 arranging them partly round the edge, and partly on the bot- 

 tom, repeated the spinning process. A few hairs and some 

 moss were then stuck about the nest and neatly woven in, the 

 hair and slender vegetable fibres being the thread, so to speak, 

 with which the moss was fastened to tTie nest. 



Mr. Mudie, also speaking of their nest-building, says that, 

 in one instance which came under his notice, " the bird began 

 at seven o'clock on a Tuesday morning, and the nest was 

 finished in good time on Friday afternoon." This was cer- 

 tainly rapid work. Mr. Yarrell says that the he-bird brings the 

 materials to the hen, who makes use of them — which is stated 

 as a general fact by Michelet — and that in constructing her 

 nest the little fly-catcher, after she had rounded it into its first 

 form, moves backwards as she weaves into it long hairs and 

 grasses with her bill, continually walking round and round her 

 nest. This, however, can only be when the situation of the 

 nest will allow of her passing round it. Our fly-catcher's nest, 

 and the nest of our picture, are placed as a little bed close to 

 the wall, and in such situations the nest has sometimes no 

 back, but simply the lining. A very favourite place with the 

 fly-catcher for her nest is the hole in a wall, the size of a half 

 brick, in which the builder fixed the spar of his scaffolding, and 



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