378 PIED WAGTAIL. 



deeply bordered on their exterior webs with white ; the greater coverts 

 black, tipped with white ; the others black, dashed with ash-colour ; the 

 tail-feathers are black, except the two outmost on each side, which are 

 black at the base, the other part white. 



The female is dusky where the male is black, with more cinereous 

 on the back and rump. This is the summer plumage ; in the autumn 

 the black feathers on the chin and throat fall off, and are replaced by 

 white ones, leaving- only a black patch, somewhat in form of a crescent, 

 on the breast. The young- birds have no black on the throat till 

 the returning spring. In this state it has been described as a variety, 

 but is in fact the constant winter plumage, regaining this black mark 

 about the month of March. 



The Pied Wagtail is a very active bird, and continually in motion, 

 running after flies. In winter they change their abode, but do not quit 

 the kingdom. As the weather becomes severe they haunt marshes 

 subject to the flow of the tide. In such places on the coast we have 

 seen them in abundance when none were to be found inland. 



Early in the spring they return to their usual summer situations, 

 and from the number that are sometimes seen together at this time, 

 attending sheep-folds and new-ploughed fields, it should seem they were 

 gregarious in their flights. In the breeding-season they seem to prefer 

 pleasure-grounds that are constantly mowed, on which they run unin- 

 cumbered, and where the insects have not sufficient cover to evade 

 their sight. 



The nest is found in various places ; sometimes on the ground in a 

 heap of stones, the hole of a wall, or on the top of a pollard-tree. It 

 is composed of moss, dried grass, and fibres, put together with wool, and 

 lined with feathers or hair. * The nests which I have examined have 

 been built on the ground, in the hole of a bank, or on the shelf of a 

 low rock, and formed of a texture of hair more than half an inch thick, 

 but evidently not all worked together hair by hair ; for several flattened 

 tufts of the same hair are placed in various parts of the walls, though 

 these tufts are usually bound down by single hairs laid obliquely over 

 them, so that the interior may preserve a smooth uniform surface.* 



The eggs are four or five in number, white, spotted all over with 

 light brown and ash colour, weighing about forty grains. They exactly 

 resemble that of the cuckoo, which bird frequently makes choice of its 

 nest to deposit her egg in. It sings very prettily early in the spring, 

 and frequently gives the alarm on the appearance of a hawk, which it 

 pursues in company with the swallows. 



