rail beneath him; she then began to stretch herself to the utmost to give him the food, but was unable to reach the cuckoo's mouth, who, like a simpleton, threw his head back, with his mouth wide open, as before. The reed-warbler, by no means at a loss, perched upon the cuckoo's broad back, who, still holding back his head, received in this singular way the morsel brought for him. I had a good view of these proceedings, being hidden from observation by a row of scarlet runners.
At first the young reed-warblers have their under parts of a tawny colour; the upper parts differ but little from the mature plumage: they have two black spots on the tongue. When about five or six weeks old the under parts change to a silvery white, and the upper parts assume much the same colour as in the adult bird.
These birds are loud, merry and untiring songsters; in the breeding season 1 have heard them sing at all hours of the night. A wild bird, which was stationed in some elder trees close to a mill-pond stream, the sides of which had a few reeds mixed with elder shrubs, and close to my house, generally commenced his song in the second week of May, and continued it until the latter end of July.
If kept in a cage and in good health, they sing all the winter, but are inclined to be mischievous, delighting in pecking other birds; the best way to prevent this is to keep them in a good- sized cage with a larger bird, such as a nightingale.
You may hear this bird singing in the season about two miles from London bridge, by the ditch-sides and mill-pond streams, at the back of the gardens in the Seven Islands, Rotherhithe, and along the Bermondsey level, as well as in a reed-bed at the back of China-hall, on the Deptford lower road; but they are not so numerous in these places now as they were about twelve years since, for the Greenwich rail-road stretches across some of their old haunts.
January 27, 1843.
Note on the occurrence of the Black Redstart near Penzance. Having recently obtained a specimen of the black redstart (Phœnicura Tithys) near Penzance, my attention was called to the fact of that bird being an occasional visitant to the west of Cornwall: and thinking the subject might possibly be an interesting one to some of the readers of 'The Zoologist,' I am induced to send you a few observations upon it.
