Page:The Zoologist, 1st series, vol 1 (1843).djvu/340

312 streams and water-courses, which give birth to numerous osiers, willows and alders, upon which trees he is most frequently met with. His food appears to consist principally of small insects, which are found enrolled within the opening buds of different forest trees, and perhaps sometimes of the tender leaves themselves. Like the wood warbler (Sylvia sylvicola) it builds a domed nest on the ground, near a dyke or hedge-bank, generally beside a stream where willows are thickly scattered, or on the outskirts of an orchard, where food may be easily obtained. A small round hole is left for the bird to enter the nest, and it is composed of dried grasses, lined with feathers, which render it beautifully soft and warm for the young brood. The eggs are of a delicate rosy white, dotted all over with minute spots of light red. The young leave the nest about the end of May, or the beginning of June, and the parents and family keep together for some time afterwards, visiting localities wherever insects abound. They devour numbers of young green grubs and caterpillars, and appear particularly partial to flies which infest roses and garden flowers, relieving them of myriads.

Wood-warbler (Sylvia sylvicola). The wood- warbler, resembling in many particulars, in its habits and manners, the willow-warbler (Sylvia Trochilus) and the chiff-chaff (S. hippolaïs), is now proved to be a distinct bird, indeed we include both species in our 'Fauna Melbourniensis.' He prefers an open and champaign country, dotted at intervals with small knolls and diversified with hedge-row timber. Tall isolated trees are his favourite haunts, especially the oak and elm, the tops of which he delights to frequent; and he generally appears just as the latter is opening into blossom. His song is always given from some elevated object, beginning in a loud clear voice, which gradually lowers in tone to its close. He arrives in this neighbourhood about the 16th or 17th of April, but in 1843 he reached us by the 12th, during a N.E. wind, and in very early seasons I have heard him by the 9th. On his first arrival he frequents the copses and plantations at some distance from the village, appearing to prefer the outer branches of the oak, willow or hawthorn, and there, hopping nimbly from spray to spray, he may be seen performing many nimble evolutions, as he examines, with the minuteness of the titmice, the partly expanded bud, accompanying his operations with a full, loud, clear song, of "twee"

"twee" uttered many times in succession, which is in unison with the season, and particularly fresh and delightful. The nest is commenced the first week in May: it is placed on the ground, in a tuft of coarse