Scandinavia and other countries situated in high latitudes are the breeding haunts of this little bird, which builds a nest very similar to the Chaffinch. It is placed fourteen or twenty feet from the ground, in the fork of a branch shooting out from the trunk of a birch or spruce fir-tree, and composed of moss, lichens, bark, mixed with thistle-down, and lined with fine grass and feathers. Its eggs number from five to seven, similar to those of the Chaffinch, the ground colour being generally green, and the spots not so dark nor large.
THE WHINCHAT.
The nest of this bird is composed of grass and moss of different kinds, the stronger on the outside, and the finer forming a lining for the interior, and is situated on the ground in positions where it is by no means an easy task for the most veteran collector to find it. It lays five or six eggs of a delicate bluish-green, rarely speckled or marked with red-brown.
THE SCOTER.
The most northern counties of Scotland are the nesting-places of this bird, which gathers together such materials as twigs, grasses, dry stalks, and leaves, placing them under cover, or in hiding, afforded by the low-growing shrubs or plants, and lining the whole with down. The eggs number from six to ten, and are of a pale greyish-buff colour, sometimes slightly tinged with green.
THE GREY WAGTAIL.
Some naturalists describe the position of this bird's nest as on the ground; but, personally, I have generally found them in the niches of rocks, or under overhanging ledges or banks. The nest is composed of moss, bents, grass, horsehair, often lined with a coat of cow's-hair, which they rub off against walls and trees in the spring-time. This bird's eggs number five or six, and are of a grey colour, mottled and spotted with ochre-grey or brown, variable.