Page:The Zoologist, 4th series, vol 2 (1898).djvu/228

196 song. At that moment the birds had descended to within a foot or so of the ground, and were so close together that they seemed almost as one. They did not separate until, after swerving upward, they had again descended and actually entered a thick pink-may bush. Throughout the incident they were never more than twenty yards distant from me.

On April 19th, near New Eltham (Kent), a male and female Chaffinch were uttering their call-note nearly overhead in an oak. They quitted the tree at the same time and swooped close together, passing within two yards of my head, and swerved up again into another tree, They were squeaking their call all the time, and during the flight, but at a moment when the birds were behind me one of them uttered a brief repetition of a full low note, precisely like the low gurgling rattle which was uttered on a similar occasion by the above-mentioned Chaffinch at Stroud.

On April 20th, at a spot a quarter of a mile from the site of what occurred on the 19th (above described), two Chaffinches were calling in an elm tree. The female was shivering her wings and repeating the love-call very rapidly. A few yards distant from her a male was hopping from twig to twig, exclaiming in the same manner. Both birds swooped, and during the flight the low rattling cry was uttered exactly as it was yesterday. The low rattle is not always heard.

On May 11th two Chaffinches swooped downwards together when passing from tree to tree, and during some portion of the descent they were very close together, breast to breast. They were all the time uttering the "chirri" very rapidly. One was certainly a female, and the other seemed to be a male. The foliage interfered with the view.

On May 12th a pair of Chaffinches descended together from the top of an oak, swerved up again nearly to the full height of the tree (forty feet) and descended as before, uttering the callnote all the while.

I have sometimes seen Chaffinches treading in a tree. The male then alights several times in succession on the female, meanwhile uttering the "chirri"; and at the last attempt, when about to quit the female, he utters the low full rattling note above mentioned, and immediately quits her and makes no further attempt for some time. It appears therefore that this full