58 
BRAMBLES AND BAY LEAVES. 
suffice it that none of the fair sex are ever permitted to co¬ 
lonise here; we have in other parts of the house a goodly 
number of happy feathered couples that enjoy connubial 
bliss and connubial cares; but in a general assemblage 
hen-birds are but a source of contention and bickering. 
But what a merry and familiar lot are these bachelor 
vocalists ! how they— 
4< Ring roof and rafter, 
With bagpipes and reeling,” 
from the first dawn of day to evening dusk, and even 
after that for hours, if indulged with a lighted lamp! 
They are all familiar, too; they cluster round their mis¬ 
tress when they have their daily supply of buns and 
insects and seeds and paste; they swarm on her head 
and shoulders, and actually chaff at her in impudent 
tones and gestures, and make such a flutter, and con¬ 
fusion and row as would drive a nervous person utterly 
mad. There are siskins, canaries, white-throats, tits, 
woodlarks, wagtails, buntings, linnets, goldfinches, red- 
poles, a young thrush, a pair of Java sparrows; a common 
sparrow, that has learned a few notes of respectable 
music, and that delights in quarrelling with everybody 
about nothing; a eouple of black-caps, a nightingale, 
and a most musical brambling, that imitates the note of 
every other bird, and almost equals the nightingale in 
some of his finest passages. 
The garden is as much a menagerie as the house. I 
have my triangular Cochins and my squatty Bramapoo- 
tras, my noble crested Polands and my neat little 
Sebriglits, that look like poultry for a doll's house, 
