THE SPARROWS. 
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kinds of materials, but thickly and warmly lined with feathers. 
It is usually placed in holes of buildings and trees, or under the 
eaves of roofs; it often occupies House-Martins’ nests and even 
the burrows of Sand-Martins. Its reproductive powers are 
proverbial, and as many as three broods are often reared in the 
season. 
Eggs. — Four to six in number, very variable in colour, even 
in specimens of the same clutch. Ground-colour white or 
greenish white, with spots and blotches of brown, purplish or 
greenish in tint. Occasionally the eggs are so thickly mottled 
with brown as to be nearly uniform, and a common type of 
Sparrow’s egg is white, dotted all over with tiny black markings. 
Axis, o'8-ro inch; diam., o'6-o'65. 
THE TREE-SPARROW. PASSER MONTANUS. 
Frivgilla montana , Linn., S. N., i.,- p- 324 (1766). 
Passer mon/anus, Macg., Br. B., i., p. 35 1 ( 1 S3 7 ) ; Dresser, B. 
Fur., iii., p. 597, pi. 178 (1875) ; Newt. ed. Yarr., ii., p. 82 
(1876); B. O. U. List Br. B., p. 51 (1883); Sharpe, Cat. 
B. Brit. Mus., xii., p. 301 (1888) ; Lilford, Col. Fig. Br. 
B., pt. ix. (1888) ; Saunders, Man., p. 173 (1889). 
Adult Kale. — Throat and fore-neck black ; back streaked 
with black ; head uniform chocolate-brown ; lesser wing-coverts 
uniform brown, not chestnut ; ear-coverts ashy whitish, with a 
black patch on the lower parts ; sides of neck white ; under 
surface of body ashy; bill black; legs light brown; iris 
brown. Total length, 5'6 inches; culmen, C45 ; wing, 275 ; 
tail, 2 - o; tarsus, 07. 
Adult Female.— Similar to the male in colour. Total length, 
5*2 inches; wing, 2'65. 
Unlike the House-Sparrow, there is scarcely any difference 
between the plumage of the Tree-Sparrow, in summer and 
winter, and the summer plumage is not acquired by any shed- 
ding of the pale tips to the feathers. Young birds resemble 
the adults, but are duller in colour. 
Range in Great Britain. — According to Mr. Howard Saunders, 
the Tree-Sparrow is extending its range in the British Islands. 
It is an inhabitant chiefly of the eastern counties of Scotland 
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