. A history of British birds . kirly PhyUopcrtha. korticola —the chovy, as it is called in EastAnglia, where in some seasons it swarms and is most mischievous. HOUSE-SPARKOW. 93 already been recorded by Graves, who, finding a nestlingSparrow in like manner entangled by a thread, observedthat the parents fed it during the whole of the autumn andpart of the winter, but, the weather becoming very severesoon after Christmas, he disengaged it lest its death mightensue. In a day or two it accompanied the old birds, andthey continued to feed it till the month of March, by whichtime it may be presumed
. A history of British birds . kirly PhyUopcrtha. korticola —the chovy, as it is called in EastAnglia, where in some seasons it swarms and is most mischievous. HOUSE-SPARKOW. 93 already been recorded by Graves, who, finding a nestlingSparrow in like manner entangled by a thread, observedthat the parents fed it during the whole of the autumn andpart of the winter, but, the weather becoming very severesoon after Christmas, he disengaged it lest its death mightensue. In a day or two it accompanied the old birds, andthey continued to feed it till the month of March, by whichtime it may be presumed to have learnt to get its -own woodcut * represents the sad fate that befel a lessfortunate Sparrow which had built its nest in the ornamentalfrieze of the Eotunda, in Dublin. Amongst the materialsused for that purpose, there chanced to be a woollen thread,with a loop at one end. By some accident the bird got itsneck into the noose ; and, all its efforts to escape being vain,was miserably hung below its own * Copied from the20th, 1844. Illustrated London News (vol. iv. p. 36) for January 94 PRINGILLID^. The SpaiTow, as before observed, is seldom seen far fromthe habitations of men; but as summer advances, and thenestlings are able to go abroad, both old and young resort inflocks to the nearest corn-fields, and feast on the milky grain ;but when the crop is carried, their supply being cut off, theyreturn to the vicinity of houses, to seek again the adventitiousmeal there afforded them. The House-Sparrow is common over nearly all of theBritish Islands, the chief exception being those of the OuterHebrides, save Lewis—where, though now abundant, iteeems not to have shewn itself till about 1830, and was notseen there even in 1842by James Wilson—andBarra—wherealone it was observed in 1830 by Macgillivray; but there aremany isolated spots in Scotland * where it is very rare, assome parts of the Highlands, according to the samenaturalist, or is altogether abs
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Keywords: ., bookauthorsaun, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1870, booksubjectbirds
