SMALLER BRITISH LAND BIRDS FOR A MUSEUM. 



53 



different directions. In the spring months, its short song is usually 

 uttered as it flits from tree to tree ; commencing always a few seconds 

 before it settles, and continuing for about a minute after it has alighted, 

 then leaving off abruptly, like the common wren. This last bird rarely 

 injures its plumage, and consequently is almost always in good con- 

 dition for stuffing : both it and the creeper vary very much in size, the 

 males continuing to grow for three or four years. The common wren 

 runs up the trunk of a tree with as much facility as the creeper. 



It would be useless here to say much on the plumage of rare species, 

 such as the roller (Coracias Europceus), the hoopoe (Upupa epops) , 

 &c. which in any state of feather are desiderata in almost every col- 

 lection ; but I may take this opportunity to mention, that the summer 

 before last a pair of hoopoes frequented a garden in this neighbourhood, 

 the male of which, in beautiful plumage, was shot, but as a specimen 

 was most irretrievably ruined by a tyro stuffier. The same summer a 

 roller was observed on Penge Common, Kent ; and in the preceding 

 winter, a number of waxwings (Boinby cilia Europcea) were shot in this 

 immediate neighbourhood. Of this last bird three specimens are neces- 

 sary to illustrate the species properly ; and as they generally appear in 

 small flocks, and are by no means shy, a sufficient number may mostly 

 be obtained to select them from : an old male, an old female, and a 

 young bird, before the singular wax-like appendages on its wings are 

 developed. 



A pair of kingfishers, male and female, should be procured in spring, 

 for though very handsome specimens may occasionally be met with in 

 winter, yet their plumage is at this time always slightly fringed with 

 an edging, which rather impairs its brilliancy. A young bird should 

 also be preserved in its nestling feathers. The attitudes of a living 

 kingfisher require to be carefully studied ; no species is more frequently 

 preserved, and yet it is exceedingly rare to see one even tolerably stuffed. 

 The form of the head and the expression of the countenance are pre- 

 cisely those of the heron ; and the soft loose feathers, also, on the back 

 of its head, being generally erected, render its physiognomy most 

 strikingly similar to those of the various Ardeidce. I kept a young 

 kingfisher in confinement last summer for about three months, during 

 which time it subsisted entirely on raw meat, which was given to it 

 soaking in a little water ; it never once tasted fish, but would occa- 

 sionally, though not often, swallow a common earth worm. It always 

 knocked its food several times violently against the perch of its cage, 

 to kill it, before devouring it ; and swallowed, without difficulty, most 



