PASSERINE BIRDS. 
172 
heaps of commons and open places ; — the halcyon upon 
small fishes : — thus all these creatures, even when they 
require similar aliment, diet at their separate boards. 
Of the Gallinaceous birds, the wood-grouse is supported 
by the young shoots of the pine in his forests ; but the 
black and red grouse live upon berries found on the 
moor, the seeds and tops of the heath ; the partridge 
upon seeds in the field, blades of grass or of corn ; the 
pheasant upon mast, acorns, berries from the hedge or 
the brake. The bustard is content to live upon worms 
alone, found in early morning upon downs and wide ex- 
tended plains, where none dispute his right or compete 
with him, but one species of plover. The doves make 
their principal meals in open fields, upon green herbage 
and seeds. The stare again feeds upon worms and in- 
sects, but in places remote from the bustard, nor does 
he contend with the rook, or the daw, but takes his 
meat and is away. 
The Passerine birds, indeed, are remarkably dissimi- 
lar in their manner of feeding. The missel-thrush will 
have berries from the mistletoe, or seeks for insects and 
slugs in wild and open places, the heath or the down. 
The songthrush makes his meal from the snail on the 
bank, or worm from the paddock ; but the blackbird, 
though associating with him, leaves the snails, content- 
ing himself with worms from the hedge-side, or berries 
from the brier or the bush. The fieldfare consumes 
worms in the mead or haws from the hedge. The 
cross-bill will have seeds from the apple, or cone of the 
fir — the green-finch, seeds from the uplands, or door of 
barn, or rick-yard. The bunting is peculiarly gifted 
with a bony knob in the roof of his bill, upon which 
he breaks down the hard seeds he is destined to feed 
upon. The bullfinch selects buds from trees and bushes. 
The goldfinch is nurtured by thistle seeds, or those of 
other syngenesious plants. Sparrows feed promiscu- 
ously. Linnets shell out seeds from the cherlock, or 
the rape, or the furze on the common. One lark will 
feed in the corn-fields, another in the mead, another in 
the woodlands — one tit-mouse upon insects frequenting 
the alder and willow ; some upon those which are hid- 
