exclaim, with old Izaak Walton, “Lord, what music hast thou provided for the saints in Heaven, when thou 
affordest bad men such music on earth !” Still “ it is a disputed point,” says the Rev. C. A. Johns in his 
‘ British Birds in their Haunts,’ “ whether the Nightingale’s song should be considered joyous or melancholy. 
This must always remain a question of taste. My own opinion is that tbe piteous wailing note which is its most 
characteristic feature casts a shade of sadness as it were over the whole song, even those portions which gush 
with the most exuberant gladness. I think, too, though my assertion may seem a barbarous one, that if the 
Nightingale’s song comprised the wailing notes alone, it would be universally shunned as the most painfully 
melancholy sound in nature. From this, however, it is redeemed by the rapid transition, just when the 
anguish of the bird has arrived at such a pitch as to he no longer supportable, to a passage overflowing with 
joy and gladness. In the first or second week of June his cataract of sweet sounds is exhausted, and his only 
remaining note is a harsh croak exactly resembling that of a frog or the subdued note of a raven.” 
The period during which the Nightingale sings is hut a short one ; for after their eggs are hatched 
other feelings come into play, and the welfare of the young engrosses all their attention : suspicion now takes 
the place of the blindest confidence ; and the bird becomes recluse, shy, and timorous. The task of in- 
cuhation performed, all is accomplished ; the old cast their feathers, and by the time the new ones are grown 
the young have attained the likeness of their parents, and old and young are stimulated to depart to climes 
where the sun still gives forth its radiant heat, and insects, so necessary to their existence, are to he found in 
abundance. The autumn actions of the Nightingale are quite the reverse of those of spring. The quivering 
wing and drooping tail of the male as it hops from branch to branch at the last-mentioned season are no longer 
to be seen, and the bird now bounds over the ground on stilted legs and with the tail erect ; and in the middle 
of the covert its plaintive note or its harsh croak maybe heard, significant of displeasure at the near approach 
of an intruder. 
I cannot close this short history of the Nightingale, that makes its summer-home of our island, without a 
few words condemnatory of the conduct of those who gain a scanty livelihood by the capture of this bird for the 
purpose of sale in the bird-shops of London and other great towns, — since by this course they deprive the rural 
districts of one of their greatest charms, with too trifling a benefit to themselves to compensate for the 
injury they inflict. No bird is so easily tra})ped, and no one is more difficult to keep in confinement: nine- 
tenths at least of those that are taken die within a month after their capture ; while those that survive pass 
a miserable existence in a darkened prison, never again to chant over the drooping blue-bell or cheer the 
loiterer along the green lanes of our favoured island. Surely the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to 
Animals, and country residents generally, might here interfere with advantage. To show the extent to which 
the practice is carried, I may cite the following passage from Mr. Hartlng’s ‘ Birds of Middlesex.’ “ A quon- 
dam keeper of my aequalntance, an adept in the art of bird-catching, told me that at one time he rented a 
cottage for which he paid £10 a year. If there was what he called “ a good Nightingale season,” he made 
more than enough to pay his rent by the capture and sale of these birds ! In one season alone he caught 
fifteen dozen, receiving eighteen shillings a dozen for them in London.” 
Of two nests, sent to me by Mr. Smither, of Churt, one was composed of a thick mass of skeleton 
leaves lined with a very few horse-hairs, and outwardly of a number of dried oak-leaves compactly 
inserted edgewnse : the other was similarly constructed on the outside; but dried coarse grasses took the 
place of the skeleton leaves, and the interior was lined with very fine stems of dried grasses. The nest is 
generally placed on the side of a bank, and occasionally in a shrub or bush two or three feet from the ground. 
The eggs, which are four or five in number, often vary from their usual olive tint ; in some taken by Mr. 
Smither the ground-colour was obscure greenish olive, blotehed with indistinct patches of a darker tint ; while 
others had a distinct zone of a richer colour at the larger end ; and Mr. Bond informs me that he has seen 
some quite blue. 
But little difference is observable in the size of the sexes ; and both are similarly coloured. When the young 
leave the nest, they are spotted and marked like young Robins ; but they soon cast off their nestling feathers, 
and assume a coating like that of their parents ; so that the adults and young are very similar when they 
depart from us in September for Morocco, where they reside until nature prompts them to return again in 
the spring. 
The Plate represents the two sexes and nest, of the natural size ; the cruciform plant is the Galium cruciaium, 
and the butterfly is the Polyommatus Alexis. 
