STA^LTTO. 
153 
in Scotch firs, the entrance placed near the branch of the 
tree, the nests being made of coarse grass, and lined with 
line grass. He also mentions in 4 The Naturalist,’ volume i, 
page 214, some built in trees that were quite flat; and again, 
page 116, that he has known them feloniously and burglari¬ 
ously occupy the holes previously excavated by Sand Martins 
for themselves, contrary to ‘Martin’s Act;’ and J. Me’Intosh, 
Esq. also, at page 204, describing a famous chesnut tree in 
the grounds of Canford House, Dorsetshire, one of five planted 
by John of Gaunt, mentions that at its base was a colony 
of rabbits, in the trunk a nest of cats, and immediately above 
the latter, one of Starlings. 
The nest is large, and fabricated of straws, roots, portions 
of plants, and dry grass, with a rude lining of feathers and 
hairs.- The birds will sometimes resort most pertinaciously 
to the same building-place, in spite of every opposition, dis¬ 
couragement, and blockade. In one instance the eggs have 
been said to have been found in the nest of a Magpie. 
The eggs, four or five to six in number, are of a delicate 
pale blue colour: some have a few black dots. 
Incubation lasts about sixteen days: both birds feed the 
young. 
Male; length, nine inches and a quarter to nine and a 
half; bill, pale yellow, except close to the base; iris, dark 
chesnut brown, sometimes yellowish; the head, which is much 
flattened on the crown, trending straight back from the bill, 
as also the neck, nape, chin, throat, breast, and back, black, 
splendidly glossed in different lights with purple, bronze, 
copper-colour, gold, and green, the latter predominating on 
the neck and head, and each feather minutely tipped with 
pale brownish white, white, or cream-coloured round or 
triangular-shaped spots, which wear out in the' spring; in 
very old birds the head and neck in front are without any 
of the white spots. 
The wings, which expand to the width of one foot three 
inches and a half to three quarters, and reach to within 
three quarters of an inch of the tip of the tail, have the 
first feather very short, the third the longest, the second the 
next, the fourth the next, the remainder slowly graduated, 
shortening by about a quarter of an inch each; greater and 
lesser wing coverts, dusky, edged with pale reddish brown; 
primaries, secondaries, and tertiaries, dusky, their outer webs 
more or less glossed with green, and margined with light 
