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Birds and Flowers . 
but be is a real nice bird ; and of all birds, Master 
Tommy is one of the most familiar and most droll. 
I had a Tomtit last winter, who made himself a 
great pet, and one day, alas ! Master Tom had 
vanished utterly. From top to bottom of the house 
was ransacked, curtains were shaken, and fenders 
were looked under. And where, if you please, 
was Master Tom ensconced ? Snugly in the seed- 
box, on a bed of hemp-seeds ! He had entered at 
one of the holes that other birds’ heads go in at ! 
Tommy’s nest, however, is well worth a visit. 
He makes a soft, warm lining of moss and hair in 
some hole, and there, on a bed of feathers, Mrs. Tom 
lays numerous eggs. I think I have seen as many 
as seventeen. Little round pinkish dots, they are 
not much bigger than peas, and if you peep in 
rashly, Mrs. Tom hisses at you, or puffs out her 
feathers boldly, and flies at you in the same way 
as my Fidd does at Mr. Dorking. 
The Goldfinches’ nests are generally high up in 
some old Apple-tree, — pretty neat little structures, 
such as you might expect; and the Chaffinches, too, 
construct a most beautiful clever nest, so closely 
made to resemble the branch it rests on, that the 
chances are you think it is merely a bulky branch 
overgrown with lichen. And Chaffie is perched 
