Food. 
Nest, &c. 
114 ANISODACTYLI. SITTA. NutHatcH 
Montacu, is not met with in Cornwall. I have not been 
able also to trace it farther north than the banks of the Wear 
and Tyne. It is an indigenous bird, and generally frequents 
wooded and inclosed situations. It runs without greater dif- 
ficulty both wpwards and downwards on the trunks and 
branches of trees, in which respect it differs from the Weod- 
peckers, whose ability is limited to an ascending direction. 
In the Nuthatch, the tail is flexible, and is therefore never 
used as a support in climbing.—It feeds upon the insects, and 
their larvee, that infest the bark of trees, and also upon nuts, 
and other hard seeds. Its method of arriving at the kernel 
of hazel-nuts or filberts is curious: having detached the nut 
from its husk, and afterwards fixed it firmly in a crevice of 
the bark of some tree, it places itself above it, with its head 
downwards, and in this position splits the nut by reiterated 
strokes of its bill, In the autumn, many of these broken nut- 
shells may be seen m the open bark of old trees, im places 
where these birds abound, as they return repeatedly to the 
same spot for this purpose. It breeds in the holes of trees, 
commonly making use of the deserted habitation of a wood- 
pecker; and Monracu tells us, that its first step is that of 
contracting the orifice by a plaster of clay, so as barely to ad- 
mit of a passage for itself.—The nest is composed of the dead 
leaves of the oak and other trees, put together without much 
regularity ; and it lays from five to seven eggs, of a greyish- 
white, spotted with reddish-brown colour, and very similar to 
those of the great Titmouse. During incubation the female 
sits very close, and it is almost impossible to drive her from 
the nest; she defends it to the last extremity, striking with 
her bill and wings, and making at the same time a hissing 
noise. In the spring, this bird produces a loud and shrill 
whistle; but the singular noise attributed to it by Dr Prorr, 
in his History of Oxfordshire, has been ascertained to proceed 
from the true Woodpeckers. It is found throughout Eu- 
rope, and it is stationary in all climates. 
