OOLOGICAL ECCENTRICITIES. 131 



in his " History of British Birds," concerning the Tree- 

 Sparrow. That famous author expressed himself to this 

 effect: — " The eggs of the Tree-Sparrow are from four to six 

 in number, and vary considerably in colour. The eggs in each 

 clutch are usually pretty uniform in colour, except one egg, 

 which is generally much lighter than the rest. These light- 

 coloured eggs may be the produce of the bird when its colour- 

 producing powers are getting exhausted." Now I have 

 observed this tendency, viz., the laying of one egg differing 

 from the rest of the clutch, in the following species : — Black- 

 bird, Whinchat, Wheatear, Eedstart (only when the eggs are 

 spotted with brown), Redbreast, Lesser "Whitethroat, Black- 

 cap, Garden Warbler, "Willow -Wren, Great Titmouse, Blue 

 Titmouse, Nuthatch, Wren, Yellow Wagtail, Meadow Pipit, 

 Tree Pipit, Tree-Creeper, Goldfinch, Greenfinch, House- and 

 Tree-Sparrows, Linnet, Bullfinch, Jay, Magpie, Carrion Crow, 

 Common Buzzard, Sparrow-Hawk, Kestrel, and Landrail. 



Considerations of space will not admit of my going into 

 details concerning all the odd eggs belonging to the different 

 species enumerated on the above list, but it will serve my 

 purpose equally well if I single out and comment on a few of 

 them. I have frequently found the Magpie's "irregularity" 

 represented by an egg of a greyish character ; in other words, 

 one very much lighter in its general aspect than all the others. 

 The Nuthatch, Great Titmouse, and Blue Titmouse, again, 

 not seldom lay one egg which displays a considerable amount 

 of the whitish ground-colour, the spots being altogether fewer 

 in number and on occasions so pronounced as to approximate 

 to blotches. At other times, the odd eggs of each of these 

 three species will be characterised by the surface markings 

 being of a much fainter — a kind of washed-out — hue. The 

 Carrion Crow not unfrequently deposits an egg of a bluish 

 cast amidst three, or four, or five others of a dark green. The 

 Sparrow-Hawk diversifies its clutch on occasions by laying an 

 egg entirely unspotted, or else one that is blushed over the 

 greater part of its milk-white surface with lovely shades of pale 

 brown. The ground-colour of the odd egg in a Landrail's 

 nest is at times of quite a different drab as compared with the 

 others; while the Lesser Whitethroat now and again gives 



