According to her peculiar fancy she built exactly in the doorway, though there were some yards of verandah on either hand; but here was the convenient ledge, forming an angle with the upright support; and here was placed, as in our picture, the small, somewhat flat nest, beautifully, though slightly, put together, of dried grass and moss, lined with wool and hair. Here the mother-bird laid her four or five greyish-white eggs, with their spots of rusty red, and here she reared her young. She had, however, it seemed to us, an uncomfortable time of it, for, though we carefully avoided giving her needless disturbance that we almost ceased to use the door, yet there was an unavoidable passing to and fro to which she never seemed to get accustomed, starting off her nest with a little flutter whenever we came in sight; nor—although before she had finished sitting the quick-growing shoots of the Virginian creeper, with its broadly-expanding leaves, hid her nest so completely that, had it not been for her own timidity, we need not have known of her presence—she never lost this peculiar trait of character. The nest which Mr. Harrison Weir has drawn is, doubtless, taken from life. I wish, however, he could have seen ours, only about ten feet from the ground, a little dome of love, embowered amongst young shoots, vine-like leaves and tendrils—a perfectly ideal nest, in which our friend, who has as keen a sense of natural beauty as any artist living, would have delighted himself. The colours of this bird are very unobtrusive: the upper parts brownish-grey, the head spotted with brown, the neck and breast streaked or spotted with greyish-brown. It is a migratory bird, and arrives in this country about the middle or end of May, remaining with us till about the middle of October, by which time the flies on which it lives have generally disappeared. [Sidenote: _How it takes its Prey._] Its mode of taking its winged prey is curious. Seated, stock-still, in a twig, it darts or glides off at the sight of an insect, like the bird of our picture, and seizes it with a little snapping noise; then returns to its perch ready for more, and so on; incessantly darting out and returning to the same spot, till it has satisfied its hunger, or moves off to another twig to commence the same pursuit.