In size the Tree Pipit most resembles the Wagtail, but it has a shorter tail. Its general colour is more like the Lark, but it is less speckled. The mantle is olive-green, the breast yellowish. The points of the folded tail are formed by the three first flight feathers; the fourth is much shorter. The nail of the back toe is long like a spur, but not so long as the toe. The beak is delicate and slightly awl-shaped. It is a nice modest little bird; its flight dips and rises again continually. It builds its nest cleverly with soft materials in the shape of a saucer, and places it on the ground on a clod of earth, under the shelter of a heap of stones, or on a grass ridge. Five eggs are laid which are very varied, a dull blue, sometimes brownish, sometimes white, with dark spots. [Illustration: USEFUL. WHITE WAGTAIL.] THE WHITE WAGTAIL. (_Motacilla alba._) Wagtails are all migrants and arrive in Hungary in great numbers. This is a lively, elegant little bird, that walks and runs well, is very active, and always wagging its tail as it goes. It hops daintily from stone to stone in the shallow water, picking up insects busily, and snapping at the flies and gnats; and over the tall grasses and banks of the water, it dashes into the air, turning and twisting in the pursuit of insects. When there is pasture land near the water, it shows itself to be a good friend to the cattle, by destroying the flies and gnats and the tiny midges of the dragonfly kind, which would otherwise torment them. Its congeners in Hungary are the Yellow Wagtail, whose underpart is bright yellow, and mantle olive-green, which wags its tail less, and confines itself to cattle pastures; the Mountain Wagtail, the upper part of which is ashen-grey, and the under side brimstone yellow. Its call is a clear “_Zeewit-zuyit-beuees_, or _zeueess_,” sometimes it sounds like “_Kwee-kwee, kweereeree-kweeree_.” * * * * * The Wagtail is 7·5 inches in length, and has a long tail. It is a very charming bird. Its plumage is of three colours--black, white, and ashen-grey. Crown, neck, and throat black; brow, cheeks, and underparts white; mantle grey; tail and wings black, the feathers of the latter being edged with white; the two outer feathers on both sides of the tail are mostly white. Rump dark-grey, underneath the tail white; bill awl-shaped, and black, as are also the slender legs. It builds its nest on the edge of the water in all sorts of places: in holes, between stones, in cracks in the earth, among roots or in wood-stacks. It lays sometimes as many as eight, but usually five white eggs, finely speckled with dark colour, the speckling thicker at the larger end, in a ring round the egg. THE BLUE-HEADED WAGTAIL. (_Motacilla flava._)