titudes disperse themselves all over the country in pairs. They build their nest near the ground, of dry grasses, and line it with hair and dried fibres; selecting a corn-field, or, more frequently, ditch banks well protected by the brambles and briars which have been allowed to grow wild. Their eggs are of a greyishyellow tint, very pale, spotted and veined with reddishbrown. While the female is fulfilling her vocation of hatching the young, the male bird makes choice of a lofty twig, upon a tall hedge, where he perches himself in his pride, and delights himself and his mate with his singular and somewhat irregular notes. The Yellow Hammer (Emberiza citrinella), or, as it is also called, the Yellow Bunting, is beautifully and delicately coloured; it is, however, so abundant that our admiration is rarely excited by its beauty, and it is chiefly regarded by the farmer as an unwelcome intruder into the yard where his cereal crops are stacked. In winter the Yellow Buntings may be seen united in little flocks by themselves, or sometimes associating themselves with the larger bodies of the Com. mon Bunting. The male cheers his mate, while engaged in the tedious task of incubation, in a manner similar to that adopted by the Common Bunting; and if approached, he takes his flight along the hedge, alighting at a little distance, and resuming his song; if followed, he repeats his flight. This species of the Bunting builds upon the ground, in dwarf bushes, among beds of nettles, or other low herbage, forming its nest of dried grasses, and lining it with hair. Its eggs are of a pale purplish white, streaked and covered with chocolate-coloured marks. : The Reed Bunting (Emberiza schoeniculus) is found in the British Islands, and from Italy to Sweden, wherever willows and aquatic herbage, growing in swamps and marshy situations, offer a suitable abode. The nests of this bird and of the Yellow Hammer have often been mistaken one for the other; but the Reed Bunting never suspends its nest between the stems of reeds, although it frequents them on the contrary, it is built in a low bush or tuft of grass; its materials are dry grass and moss, lined with hair. The Reed Bunting's eggs are pale pinky grey, spotted and veined with reddish-brown; it has no song; its food is chiefly seeds of reeds and other aquatic plants, insects and their larvæ; when the winter weather is severe, it resorts to the farm-yard, both for shelter and subsistence. The general colour of the bird is pale brown, the male having the head, throat, and centre of the chest, black; a patch of white, beginning below the angle of the bill, spreads round the neck, and extends down the sides of the breast and over the under surface; quills, brown; rump, bluish-grey. The Ortolan Bunting (Emberiza hortulana), or, as it is commonly called, the Ortolan, is said to be strictly a native of the southern provinces of Europe. Individuals of the species have been killed in this country. Its winter residence is North Africa, and in its migratory expedition it visits Gibraltar every spring and autumn. Its food consists for the most part of millet and other grains, together with insects. It constructs its nest of fibres and leaves, lines it with fine grass and hair, and chooses for its locality the covert of hedges or bushes, and the ground in corn-fields. Its eggs are reddish-grey streaked with brown, or bluish-white spotted with black. When this bird is fed in a proper manner it becomes very fat, and is extremely delicious. In the south of Europe there are several establishments for the purpose of feeding Ortolans with abundance of their favourite food, for the table. In the male bird, the throat, the circle round the eyes, and a narrow band springing from the angle of the bill, are yellow, these two yellow spaces being separated by a blackish-grey dash; head and neck grey, tinged with olive, and spotted with brown; feathers of the upper parts blackish in the middle. and reddish on their edges; under parts, reddish-bay; tail blackish, the external feather with white on the outer vanes; bill and legs flesh colour. The Chaffinches and Sparrows are familiar to all. There are slight variations of form exhibited in some American species, but they are not of particular importance. We come now to the most typical of all the Finches, forming the sub-family Coccothraustinæ, or Hard Bills. In this division are comprised, as we have before intimated, those birds which possess the most conic, largest, and most powerful bill. They are all tree birds, seeking their food amongst the branches, or on the stems and twigs of slender weeds and plants, and not resorting to the ground like the Sparrows and Buntings. Two species well known in this country, though not pre-eminently typical, will serve to convey a tolerable idea of the general structure of these birds. The other native birds which enter into the aberrant group are the Goldfinches and Linnets. The powerful bill with which the typical species are provided, enables them to break the shells of the harder kind of seeds and berries upon which they principally subsist. The Hawfinch (Coccothraustes Europaeus), for instance, feeds entirely upon the produce of various trees, such as the kernels and seeds of the beech, elm, ash, and maple; and in the winter on the berries or, rather, the seeds and stones of the juniper, service-tree, and white-thorn; it attacks also cherries and plums, the stones of which it breaks with the greatest ease, to feed upon the enclosed kernels. The species which do not possess the powerful bill of the more typical groups, such as the Linnets, Goldfinches, etc., feed upon the smaller class of seeds of wild plants, as the flax, thistle, dandelion, etc., and particularly on those of the cruciform plants. The sub-family Coccothraustine is composed of many genera, among which the Weavers (Ploceus) are conspicuous for their numbers as well as their beauty. The name Weaver was given to them on account of the surprising skill that they display in the fabrication of their nests. One of these nests mentioned by Barrow* as fabricated by a species of Loxia or Goshawk (probably of the modern genus Euplectes), is in the form of a chemist's retort. It is usually built on the extremity of a branch extending over a river or pool Travels in Africa. of water; and the shank, which is eight or ten inches long, and forms the entrance to the nest, almost touches the water. The material of which their nests are made appears to be grass or reeds, firmly put together and curiously woven. On one side of this, within, is the true nest. The bird does not build a distinct nest every year, but fastens a new one to the lower end of the old; and as many as five may thus be seen one hanging from another. From five to six hundred such nests have been observed crowded upon one tree. These pensile nests are formed of various shapes by the different species of Weavers; and one species, the Sociable Grosbeak, by the united labour of vast numbers of those birds, forms a connected structure of interwoven grass, containing various apartments, which are all covered by a sloping roof impervious to the heaviest rain. These nests are generally formed round the trunk of some tree. The following is Le Vaillant's description of one of the nests which he examined:-"I observed, on the way, a tree with an enormous nest of these birds, to which I have given the name of Republicans; and as soon as I arrived at my camp, I despatched a few men with a wagon to bring it to me, that I might open the hive and examine its structure in its minutest parts. When it arrived I cut it to pieces with a hatchet, and saw the chief portion of the structure consisted of a mass of grass, without any mixture, but so compact and firmly basketed together as to be impenetrable to the rain. This is the commencement of the structure; and each bird builds its particular nest under this |