Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 1 (1843).djvu/338

310 pretty appearance. My attention was first attracted to it by seeing a bird come out of the upper part of the tree and fly away. I found a small hole, that I could just get my finger in, at the spot where the bird appeared to fly from; and this hole seemed immediately to turn downwards, so that I could make nothing out. Being desirous of learning more of the matter, 1 retired to a short distance, and, concealing myself, watched for the return of the bird.

In a short time two birds made their appearance; one entered the hole, and appeared to be pecking away the wood inside, for as it managed to separate piece after piece, it brought them to the other bird, who remained at the entrance, and this last flew away with each piece, and carrying it to a distance from the tree, dropped it in the middle of the road, as if to avoid the detection which was almost certain to follow if the chips had been carelessly dropped at the foot of a tree in a frequented thoroughfare.

On the 12th of May, a boy having discovered the place, from the bird flying out at the moment he was passing, broke open the tree and took the nest, which contained eight eggs. I passed shortly afterwards, and had a good opportunity of observing the wonderful work which these little creatures had accomplished. It will perhaps assist my description if I give diagrams of three sections of the tree, made in different directions, two of them vertically and the third horizontally, (see p. 309). At the end of the short hole by which the birds entered, was a large cavity containing an old nest, where the young birds of a preceding year appeared to have been raised, and from the back part of this was a small round aperture leading to a second cavity, equal in size to the first, and evidently newly excavated; in this the eggs and nest of the present year were found: the passages and cavities were all finely worked, and as smooth as if done by the hand of man. Section a is cut lengthwise through one of the cavities only; section b is cut at right angles with a, and shows both cavities; and section c, cut horizontally, also shows both cavities and the passage which connected them. I have no doubt that the birds were working at the inner or new apartment when I first observed them.

I subsequently found another nest of these birds in an old sycamore tree, which, although containing only a single apartment, appeared to have been occupied many years. It required a carpenter's axe and much labour to get at this.

As a proof of the extraordinary places sometimes selected by these birds as situations for their nests, I may mention the following. An earthen bottle was placed on the garden wall of Mrs. Chorley, of Bol-