Queer Occupant of a Goldfinch’s 
Nest. 
It was a bright winter morning, with the 
thermometer dallying among the small fig- 
ures, the fields white with their winter over- 
coats and silence almost unbroken, not even 
the chirp of a Snowbird to break the wintry 
quiet, but as I passed into the street and 
walked up the deserted road the depressing 
stillness of nature was suddenly broken by 
the lively chattering of a flock of Goldfinches 
j which sprang up from the roadside at my 
j approach, where they had been gathering a 
: breakfast scant and dry from the tufts of 
grass and weeds whose tops extended above 
the snow banks that covered the ground. 
There is a cheeriness and life about the con- 
fused chattering of a flock of Goldfinches 
that gives a charm to the bleak landscape, 
though there is little in the note or the 
winter garb of the bird to remind one of the 
sweet song or the gaily painted songster that 
scattered the down from the thistle head 
last summer. 
With graceful evolutions and soft and 
gentle mingling of happy voices, the little 
flock gathered in a tree top by the roadside, 
the very same tree where a pair of their 
number during the heats of last summer 
built themselves a nest and essayed to rear 
a family. It was a broad branching oak and 
one of its far-reaching arms extended quite 
over the carriage track, and there among the 
dense foliage they built the beautiful nest. 
Travellers in their wagons could easily have 
raised themselves up and looked into it, 
situated as it was in full view of every passer, 
but I doubt if any one beside myself ever 
observed the dark spot among the foliage. 
As the birds gathered in the top of the 
tree that winter’s morning I saw in bold re- 
lief against the bleak landscape that little 
nest still securely held in its place, defying 
the storms and gales of winter and appear- 
ing as sound as when I first looked into it 
in the heats of last July. The Goldfinch 
5 2 
ugust I 
of the 
Id. All 
)f osage 
spri fppt 
ORNITT es from 
t’s nest- 
builds a compact nest, soft, firm secure and y apple 
substantial, and I have observed them out- the or- 
riding sometimes the rigors of even a second finding 
winter and reflecting credit on the marvel- ~ept in 
lous ingenuity and skill of the architect. placed 
It recalls to my mind some curious cir- ; hedge, 
cumstances in the history of this nest, chiefly astened 
to note which this article was penned. About js. One 
two weeks after I first observed it, apparently mb and 
just about completed, I essayed to look into though 
it one day in passing. Pulling the branch base to 
down till the nest was in easy reach I placed ition in 
my hand on it, and to say I was startled but daily in 
faintly expresses the feeling with which I let 0 m two 
loose my grasp on the branch as a lively hade of 
little animal sprang from the nest like a flash [ closely 
almost into my face and thence to the ground, igments 
One of those long-tailed mice that I some- appear- 
times meet in the woods had ejected the Within 
rightful owner and appropriated to his own \ within 
use the cosy little nest. This tree stood e . An- 
quite alone beside a much travelled highway, ,f a yel- 
the branch on which the nest was built ex- 5 lining, 
tending nearly at right angles from the trunk, j-. One 
as before intimated, directly over the wagon woven 
track about twenty feet from it and about 
twelve feet above the roadway. 
It is the strange and unexpected that sur- 
prises us, and of all things to have found a 
mouse in such a situation seemed the very 
last thing in the last possible place. The 
mouse met a well deserved fate on the spot. 
The birds reared their brood in another nest 
in the top of a tall chestnut tree near at hand 
and the deserted nest still waves a conspic- 
uous object at the end of the naked branch 
over the street. John N. Clark. 
Saybrook, Conn. 
O.& O.Vol.18. 4r»UT 8a3 
)on the 
driven 
an ad- 
e fee]' 
E. No 
tan five 
.11 com- , AluSXi Jaorxng, 
fresh, 1 (, r Tliistlebird. J 
If three 3 i re tlie companionship 
iltained ie country, although it 
1 more 3re - These birds make 
south about the last of 
ll uot r commence building 
/XuJ* ^ 
f 
0 
°l 
. -^erican Gol d Finche s. 
&■ **** , f?ci 
O.&O. IX. Oct. 1884. p. /2V. 
until 
it is placed in a maple tree or 
Jnd is composed of thistledown 
and horse hair. It is deeply hollowed; the 
measurement of nest is 1 1-4 in. in width by 
1 3-4 in. in depth. The nest is also very neat 
and compact. The eggs, usually four in num- 
ber, are of a beautiful bluish-white color, and 
measure 32-48 in. by 1-2 in. As the middle of 
October draws near these birds congregate in 
immense flocks (at this time they live on 
seeds) and depart for the south. 
Q, &0, XV, fane, 1890, P*88 
6 $ 
