Chapter XVI.

1. The hoopoe generally makes its nest of human ordure. It changes its appearance in summer and winter, like most other wild birds. The titmouse, as they say, lays the greatest number of eggs, some say that the bird called melancoryphus lays the greatest number of eggs after the Libyan sparrow, seventeen have been observed, but it will produce more than twenty, and, as they say, it always lays a great many. This bird also builds in trees, and lives upon worms. It is characteristic of this bird and the nightingale not to have any tip to their tongue. The ægithus has a good mode of life, and is careful of its young, but is lame upon its feet. The chlorion is a clever and diligent bird, but its flight is difficult, and its colours bad.

2. The elea, like some other birds, has an excellent mode of life, and dwells during the summer in groves and in the shade, and during the winter in sunshine, perching upon the reeds on the sides of marshes. It is a small bird, with a good voice.

3. The bird called gnaphalus has a sweet voice, its colours are beautiful, its mode of life good, and its form elegant; it appears to be a foreign bird, for it is rarely found in places where there are no houses.

4. The disposition of the crex is pugnacious, but it is ingenious in providing for its own subsistence, though otherwise an unfortunate bird. The sitta is pugnacious, but its disposition is gentle and tractable, and its mode of life good. It is said to be medicinal, for it is skilful in many things. It produces many young, which it treats with kindness, and obtains its food by striking trees.

5. The little owl feeds during the night, and is rarely visible by day. It lives in rocks and caverns, for its food is of two kinds; and in disposition it is diligent and ingenious. There is a small bird called certhius, which is bold in disposition, and lives on trees and eats the thrips (timber worm). In disposition it is diligent in search of food, and its voice is brilliant. The disposition and hue of the acanthis is bad, but it has a shrill voice.