NATURAL HISTORY NOTES. 
197 
NATURAL HISTORY NOTES AND QUERIES. 
A Swallow’s Nest. — In my coal cellar is a swallow’s nest, with a brood of 
fine young swallows — the second brood this year. I understand that the same nest 
of clay, renovated a bit, has been a birthplace for swallows for many years, and 
in which every year two broods have been reared. There is an old chimney in 
the coal cellar roof, and thither every young brood is taken after leaving the nest, 
previous to launching right out into the more open country, but what is most 
strange, my Persian cat is there in the coal cellar with four young kittens. If she 
wanted to get to the young swallows she could do so with the greatest of ease. 
She would only have to jump on to a shelf to do so, but I am not the least afraid 
she will ever attempt it, although a better mouser never lived. If she knows there 
is a mouse about she never is at rest until she has it, but I broke her from touching 
birds when a kitten. 
Hampstead. J. E. Whiting. 
A Chaffinch’s Friendship. — My aunt and I made friends with a male 
chaffinch who lived in our garden, and when he paired he brought his wife to 
call on us. We were sitting on the lawn when the introduction took place, and 
the two birds hopped round our feet and chattered rapidly, whilst looking us 
boldly in the face, and they fearlessly picked up some biscuit crumbs which we 
placed on the toes of our shoes. Eventually, they flew on the backs of our chairs, 
and a tame robin having set the example, they even alighted on our shoulders. 
We never attempted to search for their nest, though we fancied they wanted to 
take us to it, for they constantly walked in front of us when we were strolling 
round the garden. One morning, however, my aunt (who was accustomed to place 
food for them on the window sill of her bedroom), heard “ Mr. Pye,” as we called 
him, tapping against the window panes, and on looking out she saw the male 
chaffinch with a young bird on the window ledge, whom he left there, whilst he 
returned to the nest to bring another one, to be followed by his w'ife with a third 
fledgling. My aunt fetched me to look at them, and we opened the window and 
admired the young birds, the parents proudly watching us, and this performance 
was repeated each morning until the young birds came of their accord, and 
continued the friendship vouchsafed us by the parent birds. The entire family 
would now surround us whenever we went in the garden, and even accompany 
us on country walks, flitting along in the hedges whilst we walked in the lanes ; 
but having to leave home for some three months we lost sight of our friends, and 
on our return in the late autumn our pets had disappeared, leaving us but the 
memory of simple trustfulness that has ever since increased our reverence for our 
feathered comrades. L. 
Wasps.— We have had comparatively few wasps this year, and at first they 
were evidently short of food, for I have seen them go to flowers, which I think is 
not a common occurrence. I was watching the bees in some salvia bushes one 
day to see how they took the honey, which they did as with horse-chestnut blooms, 
by inserting their probosces between the involucre and the corolla, and I saw some 
wasps putting their heads into the flowers, evidently anxious to obtain the honey. 
Finding it impossible to gain admittance they attacked the throat of the flower, and 
gnawed a hole just above the involucre and put their heads in and drank the sweet 
contents. I found many blooms mutilated in this way, and though now there is 
plenty of fruit they still resort to them. 
North Aloreton, Wallingford. M. S. Young. 
The Tear-Pit in Deer. — My attention was first particularly drawn to this 
one summer afternoon when I was sitting in the garden of one of the principal 
cafes in Cassel a few years ago. The carcass of a red deer was brought out to be 
skinned and cut up, and going to witness the operations of the male cook, I soon 
entered into conversation with him. Presently, pointing to the tear-pit lying 
forwards beneath the eye, he told me that at the bottom of it there was always a 
hard substance in the form of a ball, and laying open the sinus with his knife he 
presented me with what I have now before me — an oblong ball of a sort of wax 
