ORIGINAL SKETCHES OF BRITISH BIRDS. 13 



The Blackbird (Turdus merula). 



As a songster this species stands high in my regard, and, 

 though the statement may be treated as open to question, I am 

 not at all sure that every lover of birds is able to discriminate 

 between its notes and those of the Song-Thrush. This, however, 

 by the way. It breeds early in the spring, and yet in actual 

 priority of date yields, to my thinking, to such well-known birds 

 as the Mistle-Thrush, Song-Thrush, Long-tailed Tit, and one or 

 two others. At all events, though there may be very little in 

 it, — a distinction without much of a difference, perhaps, — I have 

 noticed that the earliest nests which meet my eye as year succeeds 

 year are never those of the Blackbird. 



It would be superfluous to waste time on a discussion of the 

 nidification of so common a species, for its nest and eggs fall an 

 easy prey to every roving lad, while, in addition, there is scarcely 

 a book on the birds of these islands which does not thoroughly 

 deal with the question. Though the sites chosen for building 

 purposes exhibit an infinite and varied assortment, there is an 

 uniformity about the eggs which is sadly disappointing to the 

 ornithologist, always on the look-out for abnormal coloured 

 specimens. Nevertheless, I have on occasions taken some most 

 richly-marked eggs, approximating to the handsomest type of 

 those of the King-Ousel; and in two consecutive years at the 

 same spot in the same hedge I found nests containing five and 

 four eggs respectively, the bold markings of which I have never 

 seen equalled, certainly not surpassed. I mention this case, 

 however, as much with a view of drawing attention to how 

 addicted most birds are to repairing year after year to the same 

 haunts for rearing their young, as to show how the particular 

 type of an egg laid by any species may be pretty confidently 

 looked for again. Because I quote only a single instance, I am 

 not generalising from it alone ; I have had proof in plenty of 

 what I say. 



The unspotted variety of egg is, I believe, not uncommon, 

 though I have only once met with it, and that was near to 

 Mortimer's Cross, in Herefordshire, in the year 1888. The bird 

 was on the nest, which was placed in a thorn-bush on the brink 

 of the river Lugg ; it contained four fresh eggs of a pale apple- 



