NIGHTINGALE 
darker yellowish-brown. Before the fresh eggs 
are blown, they have usually a delicate pink flush 
from the yolk shining through the shell ; this is 
lost as they become hard-set, when, like all other 
eggs, they grow much more dull and opaque in 
colour. So far from the Robin being the pattern 
of the virtues which legend and tradition represent 
him to be, he is a regular bully among nearly all 
the smaller birds with which he generally comes 
into contact. 
NIGHTINGALE. 
(JDaulias luscinia.) 
By comparison with its widespread fame, the 
Nightingale is not a very familiar bird in the flesh ; 
it is a visitor to scarcely more than half the counties 
of England, out of the whole area of the British 
Inlands, and even where it is common, it is very 
much more rarely seen than heard. It is a dis- 
tinctly common bird, in its favourite haunts of 
green thickets and undergrowth, over most of the 
south-eastern part of England, being found in 
gradually diminishing numbers as far as the 
boundaries formed by Yorkshire, Shropshire, and 
the Severn Valley, and Devonshire. Beyond these 
limits it has appeared very rarely, though it has 
lately shown some signs of extending its range, 
