Book II. ^f^lT HO LQ gY. %^ 9 



CftAP. XIII. 



T7?e Wren, Pafler troglodites ofAldrovand y hy Turner and fBellonius called fal fly 

 Regulus. 



IT weighs three drachms, being extended from the point of the Bill to the end of 

 the Tail fourinchesand an half: The Wings ftretcht out equal to fix inches and 

 an half. The Head, Neck, and Back are of a dark fpadiceous colour, efpecial- 

 ly the Rump and Tail. The Back, Wings, and Tail are varied with crofs black lines. 

 The Throat is of a pale yellow, the middle of the Breaft whiter : Below it hath black 

 tranfverfe lines, as have alfo the fides. The lower Belly is of a dusky red. The tips 

 of the fecond row of Wing-feathers are marked with three or four fmall white fpots. 

 The tips of the covert-feathers of the Tail are alike fpotted. The number of quil- 

 feathers in each Wing k eighteen. The Tail, which for the moft part it holds eredt, is 

 made up of twelve feathers. 



The Bill is half an inch long, (lender, yellowifh beneath, dusky above : the Mouth 

 withinfide yellow : The Irides of the Eyes hazel-coloured. The outer Toes are faft- 

 ned to the middle one as far as the firft joynt. It creeps about hedges- and holes, 

 whence it is not undefervedly called Troglodites. It makes but fhort flights, and if it 

 be driven from the hedges, may eafily be tired and run down. 



It builds its Neft fometimes by the Walls of houfes, in the back-fides of Stables, ot 

 other Out-houfes covered with ftraw, but more commonly in Woods and Hedges, 

 Without, of Mofs, within, of hairs and feathers. This Neil is of the figure of an 

 Egg, eredt upon one end, and hath in the middle of the fide a door or aperture, by 

 which it goes in and out. Being kept tame it fings very fweetly, and with a higher 

 and louder voice than one would think for its ftrength and bignefs \ and that efpeci- 

 ally in the Month of May, for then it builds and breeds. It lays nine or ten,and fome- 

 times more Eggs at a fitting. 



A late Englifh Writer tells us, that he hath had eighteen Eggs out of one Neft, and 

 fixteen young ones out of another. It is ftrange to admiration that fo fmall a bodied 

 bird fhould cover fo great a number of Eggs, and more ftrange, that it ftiould feed 

 fuch a company of young, and not mifs one bird, and that in the dark alfo. They 

 breed twice a year, about the latter end of April, and beginning of June, or middle 

 of it. The Young are to be fed and rear'd like the young Nightingales, giving them 

 often, and but one or two morfelsat a time. Give them once in two or three days a 

 Spider or two. 



It perfectly cures the Stone of the Kidneys or Bladder ( as Aetius writes ) being 

 faked and eaten raw 3 or being burnt in a pot cloie-covered, and the alhes of one 

 whole bird taken at once, either by it felf, or with a little * Phyllon and Peppery or * A kind of 

 laftly, being roafted whole, only the feathers pluckt off and caft away. ***** 



All the Modern Writers of the Hiftory of birds before Gejher take this bird to be 

 the Regulus of the Ancients. 



Ghap. 



