singmg together in concert at one and the same time. The same spot,
commonly the most elevated in the hedgerow, grove, or wood, or
in barren districts the summit of a rock, is chosen day after day, in
the neighbourhood no doubt of the nesting place at pairing time.
Mr. Thompson saw one perched on a rag-weed which overtopped the
heath, in the absence of any trees.
'1 he Thrush begins to sing in the very earliest part of the year,
even in January or February, according to the season, and has been
heard so soon as the 3rd. of the former month: the heaviest rain
does not stop it-- lay. Mis. Harriet Murchison, of the Priory, Uicester,
Oxfordshire, write-- me word thai on Christmas Day, 1852, one was
heard sweetly singing his carol in the park of Magdalen College,
Oxford. Those to whose cars the voice of the Throstle is familiar,
and before whose minds the recollection of their schooldays brings
the mime of ' Ludovique Desprez,' will be able to appreciate the
suggestion of a similitude of that date between the sweet note of
the bird and the liquid name of the editor of the Delphin edition of
Horace. A somewhat similar classical likenesss has been recorded in
reference to the note of the Blue Titmouse, and the 'Pleasures
of Memory' will at all events, I feel assured, be allowed to plead in
excuse of the comparison, even if the resemblance be not so striking
to other minds as it is to mine, and 1 doubt not is also to those of
some of my old schoolfellows.
The Thrush begins to sing so early as from one to two o'clock in
the long midsummer mornings, and may be heard at night till long
after dusk. It may be taught to whistle many tunes and waltzes with
great precision. It sometimes sings while sitting on the nest, and I
have seen and heard one which had been singing on a tree continue
the notes in flying from it. When perched upon a tree, whether
it be a high or a low one, it is almost always at or near the top
that the strain is uttered.
Nidification commences the latter end of March, and the eggs are
deposited earlier or later in April, though sometimes not until May,
according to the season. Nests have been known to have been begun
even so earlv as the middle of February, but frost caused them to be
deserted. The young are correspondingly able to fly from the latter
end of April to the middle of June, and have been known to have
been hatched even on the last day of March. Mrs. Murchison, of
Uicester Priory, has forwarded me intelligence of a nest with four
eggs, which was found at that place on the 6th. of January, 1853.
A second brood is generally reared in the season, and if one set of eggs
is destroyed, a second is produced in a fortnight, or even a third if
need be. The female is extremely attentive to her charge, and will
sit on the nest until quite closely approached, and will sometimes suffer
herself to be taken sooner than forsake it. In frequented places she
soon becomes familiarized to persons passing and repassing. If you
disturb and alarm her, she will testify her anxiety by flying round
you with ruffled feathers and out-spread tail, uttering a note of alarm,
and violently snapping the bill. The male on such occasions will fly
to her assistance, making a similar demonstration of anger and alarm.
If unmolested, both birds have been known to pick up crumbs of
bread thrown down to them, and to give them to their young.
I n one instance, namely, at Ormskirk, in Lancashire, the Thrush
has been known to pair with the Blackbird. A like case, recorded
by Mr. Macgillivray, occurred at Moss-side, in Scotland.
Mr. Macgillivray had a male Thrush, which, when only six weeks
old, brought up a brood of half-fledged Larks, and also fed a young
Cuckoo with the most tender care and anxiety. The Thrush was
however repaid with the most base ingratitude by his thankless protege,
for after he had taught it to feed itself, it repeatedly attacked its
benefactor, and would scarcely even allow him to partake of the least
atom of food. Another, also a young bird, kept in a cage with a young
Blackbird by a gentleman in the city of Norwich, having soon learned
to feed itself, undertook the care of its companion, which it fed perseveringly
for ten days, until at the expiration of that period it too
was able to feed itself, which before it was not. If the eggs of another
kindred species should be placed in the nest of a Thrush, both will
be educated together without distinction—'nullo discrimine.'
The nest is composed of moss, small twigs, straws, leaves, roots, stems
of plants, and grass, compacted together with some tenacious substance
with tolerable ingenuity, and is lined with a congeries of clay and
decaved wood, and in some instances reeds and thistle-down. 'It is
smoothed by the action of the bird turning round in the inside,
evidently for the purpose, a similar action being employed by many
other birds to lay close the down or hair, or other material selected
for the lining of the nest. Its diameter is usually about three inches
and a half or four inches inside, and about seven outside, its depth
from two and a half to four. It is placed in a hedge, evergreen,
low tree, hazel, black-thorn, white-thorn, or thick bush of any kind,
at a small height from the ground, and likewise at times on a rough
bank among roots, moss, brambles, or shrubs, as also, where the country
is uuwooded, under the shelter of some projecting stone or crag, in
the crevice of a rock, or in a tuft of heath; sometimes on the stump
or against the side of a tree, especially if covered with ivy: at Nun