ATTRACTIVE QUALITIES.--It is perhaps a sufficient eulogium to say that this bird rivals the nightingale, and many persons even give it the preference. If it has less volume, strength, and expression, it is more pure, easy, and flute-like in its tones, and its song is perhaps more varied, smooth, and delicate. It sings also for a much longer period, both when wild and in confinement, its song being hardly suspended throughout the year by day, and prolonged, like that of the nightingale, far into the night, though begun at dawn. The female sings also, but in a more limited degree, very much like the red-breast, which has caused it to be mistaken for a particular species with a redcap. The call is a sort of smart "_tack_," repeated quickly several times. The sudden view of an unknown object, or of an imminent danger, makes it utter a hoarse disagreeable cry of fear, very like a cat when hurt[88]. THE FAUVETTE. Sylvia hortensis, LATHAM; La Fauvette, BUFFON; Die graue Grasmücke, BECHSTEIN. The length of this bird is five inches, two and a half of which belong to the tail. The beak, five lines in length, and formed as in the preceding, is brown below, light lead-colour above, and whitish within; the iris is brownish grey; the feet, nine lines high, are strong, and lead-colour; the upper part of the body is reddish grey, tinted slightly with olive brown; the cheeks are darker, and round the eyes whitish; the under part of the body, including the breast and sides, is light reddish grey; the belly is white as far as the under coverts of the tail, which are tinged with reddish grey; the knees are grey; the pen-feathers and tail-feathers are brownish grey, edged with the colour of the back, and spotted with white at the tips; the under coverts of the wings are reddish yellow. The female differs only in having the under part of the body, as far as the breast, of a lighter colour. HABITATION.--When wild, this bird, which is found all over Europe, appears to prefer the groves and bushes which skirt the forests, as well as orchards in their vicinity. He arrives some days before the nightingale, and departs at the end of September. In confinement he is treated like the blackcap, and, being more delicate, must be furnished with a cage. FOOD.--When wild the fauvette feeds on small caterpillars and the other little insects which are found on the bushes, where he is continually searching for them, uttering at the same time the sweetest and softest song. After midsummer he appears very fond of cherries; he eats the pulp up to the stone, and this causes his beak to be at this season always stained; he also likes red currants and elderberries.