33* THE NATURAL HISTORY 
young fomctimes, become the prey of (Jogs, foxes, 
weafels, polecats, and fnakes. 
The female lays five eggs, fits very clofe, and 
only leaves her ncft in the evening, when prefled 
by hunger; whilft fhe is abfent, the cock feems 
to watch the nefl. in eighteen or twenty days 
the young are hatched. The number of males 
is faid to exceed the number of females, fo much, 
that if by accident the cock fbould be killed, the 
female would foon be fupplied with another, fo 
that the young birds would not fuffer. 
The female, like the female Canary Bird, feeds 
her young with food that file brings up out of her 
own flomach ; the father aflifls in the care of the 
young, and then it is that he feldom lings: pro¬ 
bably that he may not difeover the nefl; though 
’t it fhould be approached, he does not pradtice 
any of that artifice which fome other birds em¬ 
ploy to miflead, but oftentimes betrays it by his 
fears, and his cries. 
In fifteen days the young are fledged. 
In Augufl, the old and the young Nightingales 
leave the woods, and frequent bufhes, hedges, 
and fields lately ploughed, perhaps in order to 
procure a greater plenty of worms, and infers. 
If an attempt be made to rear young Nightin¬ 
gales, it will be bed to take thofe of the firfl hatch, 
