Little Bird 
Friends. 
(108) 
THE BIRD WORLD. 
natives (aborigines or blackfellows they are 
generally called) are a very degraded race, very 
dull and stupid, and though efforts have been 
made to teach and civilise them, they have met 
with very little success. They are now rapidly 
dying out, as most native races do when white 
men settle in their country. 
The Home of the Zebra Finch. 
It is in South Australia that the greater number 
of Zebra Finches live. I have some friends who 
live in Adelaide. In the summer, about Christ¬ 
mas Day, it is so extremely hot there that they 
generally leave the town and have a holiday in 
the country among the slopes of Mount Lofty. I 
imagine them sometimes sitting enjoying the 
cool of the evening, seeking a little shade under 
some blue gum trees, and saying to each other, 
“ How the Zebra Finches are chattering ! ” 
Those English who have settled in Australia, 
and even their children who have 'been born there 
and have never seen England at all, still have 
such a love for the mother country that they 
speak of it affectionately as “home.” They try, 
too, though all is so different about them, to keep 
up some of the customs of Old England. 
Though it is so very hot at Christmas time they 
like to have roast beef and plum-pudding for 
dinner. It must be hard work to enjoy these 
things, I should think; fruit and ices would seem 
more tempting. Then they talk of white frost 
and snow. But these are so rare in Australia 
that only a few people have ever seen any there. 
(To be Continued.) 
Brown or Tawny Owl. 
From a living specimen reared by hand, and photographed 
by Mr. Fred Cusden, 
In the Woods and Fields. 
By H. NORMAN, 
A Rare Resident Bird—The Dartford Warbler. 
Among the rarer birds we must number the 
Dartford Warbler. He is an English resident 
bird, and was first known to science through a 
specimen that was shot at Dartford, in Kent. 
He is a bird of the commons and heaths, and we 
may occasionally get a glimpse of his tiny body 
as he skulks among the furze bushes. He appears 
to feed almost exclusively upon insects, and be¬ 
ing a resident species is constantly struggling for 
existence. 
Why a bird of such fragile build should be a 
resident with us, when more robust species leave 
before the summer days are past, is very puzzling. 
So delicate and frail is this little chap that one 
watches his incessant efforts to sustain life with 
a feeling of pity. He appears never to wander 
far from the common where he first saw the 
light, and given a favourable season or two will 
slightly increase in numbers, but the first very 
severe winter cuts off many of them, almost to 
extermination. He closely resembles the Grass¬ 
hopper-Warbler in his skulking habits, scram¬ 
bling from brier to bramble, from furze bush to 
bracken, with just ai shaking of the undergrowth 
to indicate the spot and the direction in which he 
is moving. He rarely takes wing, and must be 
hard pressed indeed to indulge in a lengthy 
flight. 
When spring advances and the gorse bushes 
are laden with the golden blossoms, this little 
Warbler appears to awaken to new life; then he 
may be seen flitting about with renewed energy, 
running up the stems of the bushes and dropping 
suddenly into the thick undergrowth, reappearing 
elsewhere and warbling his sweet little song. 
Occasionally he will dart into the air, fluttering 
after a passing insect in the manner of the Fly¬ 
catcher, but lacking the Fly-catcher’s adroit¬ 
ness. He will occasionally be seen in some 
quiet garden adjoining the heath or com¬ 
mon hunting among the fruit-trees, and no doubt 
in the autumn mbnths he varies his diet by in¬ 
dulging in the wild fruits of the brambles and 
bushes. 
Few have had the good fortune to see the cun¬ 
ningly-concealed nest of this species; it is placed 
in the thickest parts of the common, where the 
tall grass meets the thick bushes, and last year’s 
leaves rest among the. dead twigs. The con¬ 
struction of the nest aids concealment; dead grass- 
stalks, scraps of moss, and withered furze, lined 
with finer material and a few stray hairs inter¬ 
woven. It is a pretty little home, not over deep, 
and flimsily built. The small eggs closely re¬ 
semble those of the Whitethroat, but are just a 
shade smaller and somewhat darker in markings. 
