It is also interesting and curious to note that a bird which inhabits two countries, in summer and winter, regulates his habits in accordance with the degree of friendliness or hostility exhibited towards him by the human inhabitants of the respective areas. The bird has in fact two traditions with regard to man's attitude towards him--one for each country. Thus, the field-fare is an exceedingly shy bird in England, but when he returns to the north if his breeding place is in some inhabited district in northern Sweden or Norway he loses all his wildness and builds his nest quite close to the houses. My friend Trevor Battye saw a pair busy making their nest in a small birch within a few yards of the front door of a house he was staying at. "How strange," said he to the man of the house, "to see field-fares making a nest in such a place!" "Why strange?" said the man in surprise. "Why strange? Because of the boys, always throwing stones at a bird. The nest is so low down, that any boy could put his hand in and take the eggs." "Take the eggs!" cried the man, more astonished than ever. "And throwing stones at a bird! Who ever heard of a boy doing such things!" Closely related to this error is another error, which is that noise in itself is distressing to birds, and has the effect of driving them away. To all sounds and noises which are not associated with danger to them, birds are absolutely indifferent. The rumbling of vehicles, puffing and shrieking of engines, and braying of brass bands, alarm them less than the slight popping of an air gun, where that modest weapon of destruction is frequently used against them. They have no "nerves" for noise, but the apparition of a small boy silently creeping along the hedge-side, in search of nests or throwing stones, is very terrifying to them. They fear not cattle and horses, however loud the bellowing may be; and if we were to transport and set loose herds of long-necked camelopards, trumpeting elephants, and rhinoceroses of horrible aspect, the little birds would soon fear them as little as they do the familiar cow. But they greatly fear the small-sized, quiet, unobtrusive, and meek-looking cat. Sparrows and starlings that fly wildly at the shout of a small boy or the bark of a fox-terrier, build their nests under every railway arch; and the incubating bird sits unalarmed amid the iron plates and girders when the express train rushes overhead, so close to her that one would imagine that the thunderous jarring noise would cause the poor thing to drop down dead with terror. To this indifference to the mere harmless racket of civilization we owe it that birds are so numerous around, and even in, London; and that in Kew Gardens, which, on account of its position on the water side, and the numerous railroads surrounding it, is almost as much tortured with noise as Willesden or Clapham Junction, birds are concentrated in thousands. Food is not more