92 
PICTURES OF BIRD LIFE. 
the Bottle Tit. We have found it in the middle of a thick bramble or hawthorn 
bush, with the twigs of which it is so interwoven that they must be cut before 
the nest can be removed. Owing to the blue and silver-coloured lichens which 
are fastened to the outside, itself made of moss, wool, and spiders’ nests, the nest 
is very difficult to be detected save by a practised eye. The inside is thickly 
lined with soft feathers. Macgillivray counted these in one case, and found them 
to be 2,379 i n number. The eggs are very small, white with pale reddish dots, 
seven or eight in number, but so many as sixteen have been found. It has 
been suggested that when a large number are found in one nest they have been 
laid by more than one bird. The nest once found is seldom forgotten, it is such 
a marvel of beauty and ingenuity. The notes of the Long-tailed Tit are weak, 
but pleasing, harmonising well with the silence of the woods in which it delights. 
Its curious nest may be compared with that of a Continental species (P. pendu- 
linus), found in the southern and eastern provinces of Europe. This nest is made 
in the form of a flask, hanging from a bough of willow or other aquatic tree. 
It is woven from the cotton-like down of the poplar or willow, with an opening 
in the side, and generally overhangs the water. The White-winged Tit ( P . niger) 
is another beautiful member of this family. It is found in South Africa. 
Jesse notices how fitly the nest of the Long-tailed Tit is softly lined with 
warm feathers; inasmuch as having a large number of young ones to provide 
for, the parent bird must necessarily be absent a long time, and so in default of 
her own warmth takes these measures to secure it for the brood. 
A very beautiful bird known as the Bearded Tit (Calamophilus biarmicus) is 
in reality of a different family. It seems to have prevailed along the eastern 
coast in the fens of Lincolnshire and the Norfolk Broads until draining became 
common, but is now only found, and that sparsely, in the latter locality. It is 
abundant in similar places in Holland, and has been noticed in Albania and 
Southern Spain. A loose tuft of long, black, lanceolate feathers, springing from 
the side of the chin and throat, forms a kind of moustache to this bird. The 
rest of its plumage is bluish-grey and orange-brown. These birds are very sociable 
in their watery haunts, living on water-snails and the seeds of the reeds. Their 
note is like “ ping, ping,” briskly repeated. The nest is placed on a tuft of 
sedges or reeds near the ground, and holds from four to six eggs, white dashed 
with red spots. 
The Tomtit is not a bird greatly favoured by the poets, nor does much 
folk-lore seem to attach to it. We have, however, lately heard of a Shropshire 
