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PAltIDiE. 
sugar. Confined in the same cage with this bird were some other 
species, and among them a redbreast, which it sometimes annoyed 
so much as to bring upon its head severe chastisement. A 
favourite trick was to pull the feathers out of its fellow prisoners. 
The young willow wren already alluded to was sadly tormented in 
this way. A similar attempt was even made on a song thrush 
introduced to its domicile, but it was successfully repelled. This 
mischievous tit escaped out of doors several times, but always 
returned without being sought for. 
The blue titmouse, as is well known, sometimes chooses singular 
places for its nest. An ornamental jar in the green-house at Elm 
Park, near Dublin, was selected in the spring of 1844, though 
the aperture through which the birds had to pass, to reach its 
roomy portion, seemed hardly large enough to admit them ; they 
flew into and out of the jar, regardless of persons being present. 
Mr. Poole too remarks : “ A jar which I placed in a horizontal 
position on my window-stool was in a few days tenanted by a pair 
of blue tits, who after cleaning out some rubbish of which they 
did not approve, have set hard to work to manufacture a snug 
abode for themselves and progeny. The cock blue tit came one 
morning to feed the hen with a fly at a time, when she had a 
bunch of materials for her nest in her mouth. She quickly dropped 
them, however, and received the proffered morsel with every ap- 
pearance of gratification at her mate's gallant attention. May 1st : 
the blue tits at my window-stool are very early risers, indeed 
generally commencing the labours of the day as soon as light sets 
in, and consequently long before the sun appears. The cock at 
first paid little attention to his mate in her labours, farther than 
by holding himself ready and willing for a fight with any strange 
birds of his own species that might venture too near his sanctuary 
— at the commencement another pair used frequently to contest 
possession — ■ but eventually was very assiduous in feeding her. 
He came frequently at intervals of half a minute with a fly or cater- 
pillar, and inserting his head at the neck of the jar delivered it to 
his patient mate. 
“In the breeding season I have frequently seen blue tits 
