MEADOW PIPIT 
87 
rising into the air, and descending to its perch 
again in a parachute-like manner, still in song. 
The nest is built about the middle of May of dry 
stems, roots, and moss, lined with fine grass and 
horsehair, and is well concealed upon the level 
ground or in the side of a bank, among the grass 
and mixed vegetation. Five eggs are generally 
laid ; they vary a great deal, but there are three 
well-defined types. In one of these the ground 
colour is greyish-white, densely speckled with fine 
markings of deep reddish or chocolate-brown ; this 
type is very like a rather warmly-coloured Meadow 
Pipit's egg, though it is larger in size. In the 
second type the ground colour is a darker and 
more mottled greyish-green, richly marbled and 
clouded with still darker shades of the same colour, 
the spots having often a sort of central pip or root. 
The third type has the same cloudings and mark- 
ings and pip-like centres, but the whole scheme of 
colour is carried out in a warm and beautiful 
reddish-brown. Illustrations are given of two of 
these varieties. 
MEADOW PIPIT. 
(^Anthus pratensis.) 
Titlark, Meadow Lark, Moor Tit, Moss- 
cheeper. — This is the commonest bird of moorland 
