62 CAGE AND SINGINa BIRDS. 
Occasionally it may be found under a fence or old park* ui 
paling, or among the feathery fern, or the trunk of a 
fallen tree ; the materials are small root fibres, grass, and 
sometimes a little hair. The eggs are four or five in num- T 
ber, of a reddish or yellowish white, inclining to brown, 
with spots and speckies, and occasionally a few wavy lines k 
of rusty brown, or dark reddish gray ; the second laying a 
generally takes place in July, after which the song of the ^ i 
bird is seldom heard in the fields or woods. The female j 
woodlark is the handsomest bird of the two, the colours a 
being darker and clearer, and the markings more distinct l 
than in the male. Purchasers should look to this, as the l 
dealer's word is too often not much to be dei>ended on. ^ 
Young woodlarks, when taken from the nest, should be g 
nursed on ants' eggs, and bread soaked in milk. It is best ^ 
to get the parent birds also, and this may be easily accom- ^ 
plished by putting limed twigs on the nest, or going with \ 
a night net, after some mark has been put to indicate the \ 
exact spot, and so enclosing the whole family. In winter 
limed twigs, or a net, over places cleared from snow, and 
baited with insects, will often effect the capture of wood-' ' , 
larks. In spring', a good decoy-bird, to lure them to j 
the trap, may be used with advantage; or a tame bird of , 
the same species, with a forked twig, smeared with bird- 
lime, attached to it ; in this way you will be pretty 
sure to capture a male. Newly-caught birds of this 
species should be put into a store-cage, and fed upon 
ground hemp and poppy seed, with ants' eggs, meal-worms, . 
maggots, and raw meat; and this kind of food, with bread- 
crum.bs, and occasionally bullock s-heart, boiled and grated, 
sweet curds, oats, and malt crushed, may be given to them. 
They will eat the universal paste, but should not be kept 
too closely to it. It has been found of advantage to give 
them now and then a little powdered chalk; and they 
should always have a good supply of clean, fine sand, in a 
vessel sufficiently large for them to roll in. About once a 
week, too, they should have a moist fresh turf, which ; ' 
cleanses and preserves their feet, that appear to be especially 
bable to disease. Bechstein remarks, that this bird seldom 
lives more than a year in confinement, a broken leg being 
tcenerally the cause of death. In his opinion it is superior *iB 
