Mode of Taking.—This can rarely be accomplished but by placing limed twigs on the nest, which is a cruel method, and the nest is often deserted as soon as it has been approached. Neither will these birds go to the water-trap: they may be caught occasionally in bird-traps in August, by baiting them with currants[104]. The surest way then is to take them young, especially as the old ones cannot be tamed.
Attractive Qualities.—The song of the arbour bird is sweet, varied, full of power and melody, long sustained; yet some harsh strains have been remarked, and some resembling the notes of the chimney swallow. Whilst singing its throat is much dilated. Its call is dak, dak! hyovie, hyovie! Its plumage is pretty.
ACCOUNT OF THE ARBOUR BIRD, FROM THE “FIELD NATURALIST’T MAGAZINE.”
“British writers, since the time of Pennant and White, have rendered the history of several of our smallest birds a mass of confusion, which even now it will be difficult to clear up, though I feel confident I possess the means of loosening two at least of the knots of the controverted points, as I shall presently show.
“When I was residing, in the summer of 1832, at Bonn, on the Rhine, my friend M. Wichterich brought me a pair of birds with their young, which at first sight, judging from colour and size, I took to be pale canaries, till I looked at their bills; I perceived then that it was a species with which I was unacquainted, and certainly not known as British. I was accordingly not a little surprised when he told me it was the Sylvia Hippolais of Bechstein, and astonished when he said it was one of the finest song birds in Europe, very superior to the blackcap and fauvette, and in some respects even to the nightingale. I thence concluded that it was the species whose splendid song had charmed and puzzled me in an orchard at Schiedam, in Holland, and again in the gardens of Prince Maximilian, at Neuwied, on the Rhine; the rich intonation and multitudinous variety of the notes fully bearing out my friend’s opinion. This circumstance alone would go far to prove that the species is not British, for it would be impossible so fine a song bird could be concealed, particularly as it haunts gardens, and is rarely found in woods. The very contrary of the statement of Temminck, whose authority, how high soever it may be in other matters, is, with respect to habits and field observations, of not the slightest weight: he might have seen the bird, if he ever looked beyond his cabinet, in most of the gardens about Leyden, where he resides.
“I kept the old birds with their young, which they fed in a cage for some time, but to my great regret they fell a sacrifice to the common enemy of cage birds. About the same time I was delighted to find a nest of the same species in a lilac-tree in my own garden, about half a dozen yards from my parlour windows. Three of the young after leaving this nest were secured, and their mother was caught to feed them, which she did successfully, and I brought them all, and three others, home with me to England. The nest was about seven feet high from the garden level, and ten from the base of a low wall, over which the branch where it was built leaned. The workmanship of the nest is very superior to that of the blackcap, coming nearer in character to that of the finches. The frame-work is rather thick, made of dried grass stems, sewing thread, fine wood shavings, birch bark, and small pieces of linen rag. The inside is very neatly lined with roots, hair, and a few feathers and small locks of wool.
“In the full grown male the bill is about half an inch long, straight, somewhat blunt, broad and flat at the base. The upper mandible has an exceedingly indistinct notch, and is greyish blue; the under mandible yellowish, with a tinge of red; the angles yellowish, and the opening of the mouth lemon yellow. The tongue is yellow, abrupt at the point, and furnished with three bristles. The iris is dusky brown. The forehead is low, flat, angular, and pointed. The eyebrows and eyelids are yellow, and a yellow line runs from the nostrils to the eyes. The crown of the head, neck, back, and wing-coverts are olive grey, inclining more to green on the rump. The shoulder of the wing (campterium, Illiger) is yellow: the primary quill-feathers are dusky brown, with a slight fringe of olive grey; the rest of the quill-feathers have a broader fringe of greyish white, which, when the wing is closed, forms a whitish patch. The tail is two inches long, the feathers being of equal length, and of very nearly the same colours and tinge as the wing-quills. All the under parts of the body are of a fine clear lemon colour. The legs are five-sixths of an inch high, and of a lead colour; the claws greyish brown. The whole length is five inches and a half; the extent of the wings nine inches.
The female is sometimes, but not always, rather paler than the male. The young have the yellow parts very pale.
A species very similar to this has been discovered in Italy by Prince C. Buonaparte—the Sylvia icterina? of Vieillot, which frequents marshy places.