8 WARBLER. 



The keeping this bird in confinement in a cage requires much 

 attention, for if an old one be caught at its first coming, it begins to 

 sing in about six or eight days, and after the usual time, the song 

 goes off; and again at the end of December, and so in every year : 

 but if brought up from the nest, it sings the whole year round, 

 except during the time of moulting, and often better than the wild 

 Nightingale. How long the life of the Nightingale may be, does not 

 seem well ascertained : a friend of mine* informs me, that a person 

 whom he was acquainted with in London, kept one for six years and 

 seven months, and its death was then supposed to have occurred from 

 want of proper care ; and further, that he has kept one himself for 

 three years and a half, and that it used to sing all the winter, but the 

 chances against preserving the bird for even the last named period 

 are so few, as to dishearten most people from the attempt, and may 

 lead one to think with Thomson, that the Nightingale is — 



" too delicately fram'd 

 " To brook the harsh confinement of the cage." 



He adds, that when the Nightingale sings fluently, he is a most 

 charming bird, but not always disposed to do so at the will of its 

 master; in which case a small child's rattle, put into motion, has 

 been known to provoke it to obedience. 



We have been informed, that Nightingales may be seen hanging 

 out of almost every other window at Warsaw, in Poland, and their 

 music, to any one passing through the street in the morning, is 

 delightful ; and it was understood, that both there, and at Saint 

 Petersburgh, where they are also kept in numbers, their principal 

 food was ant's eggs. A composition sold in London, called German 

 paste, is recommended for the food of this, as well as other slender- 

 billed, and soft feeding birds, but how far this answers we have had 

 no experience. 



* Mr. H. Grimston. 



