Other birds, like the reed-warbler, build in reeds; this seems a very safe plan. Here you see several tall green reeds growing out of the water, and about a foot above the water the bird has made a clever nest, twisting bits of roots and grass together, and lacing them in with the reeds, which are strong enough to hold such a dainty thing. So the little nest swings and sways with the wind over the water, and the reed-warbler is safe from cats, at all events; but one imagines the young birds must sometimes tumble out and get drowned before they can fly.
A very odd bird is quite near this, and that is the butcher bird. He really is a butcher--that is to say, he kills tiny animals and even other little birds, and keeps them in a larder for use. For this purpose he chooses a bush with thorns, perhaps a hawthorn, and then when he catches any small creature he sticks it on the thorns and leaves it there spiked until it is wanted. Look at this one's larder. He has a wretched little dead sparrow hanging by its neck from a big thorn, and two or three bumble-bees spiked too. We can imagine the mamma saying to the little ones: 'No, dears, you mustn't have any sparrow to-night just before you go to bed; it would give you indigestion and make you dream. Papa will have some of that for his supper, but if you'll be good children I'll give you each a bit of bumble-bee.' The mother bird is talking to a young one who has got out of its nest. They are fat, strong little birds, as they should be with such food.
After this we come to bigger birds--ducks and puffins. Puffins have beaks like poll parrots, and are about the size of a rook; they have neat white shirt-fronts, and their beaks are red and yellow and blue, but they have silly faces, as if they thought of nothing but their own fine clothes. They live near water on cliffs, and sometimes use an old rabbit burrow for a nest, in which they lay one pure white egg, and one only. When the young one is hatched the parent birds feed it on tiny fish and minnows. You can see here the puffin bringing up a minnow in his beak for supper.
Beyond are great grey and white gulls, with their keen beaks and strong legs. They are pirates, the gulls, and will eat other birds' eggs if they can get them; they are wild and fierce. Another sea-bird, very different in appearance, is the little stormy petrel. Very small and graceful; he is a thin little bird, with a dark-brown coat, but at heart as wild as the proud gulls. He is never happy except when dancing over the cold grey waves and feeling the dash of the spray. The petrel is at sea all day, and scorns the quiet land and delights of home. The howl of the storm, the clash of the water is music to it, and it would pine and die in a cage on land. When it wants to lay an egg, it makes a nest not far from its beloved sea, and lays there one egg; but even when the young one is hatched the mother cannot give up her wandering life. She is a wanderer by nature, and she only comes back at nights to see that the little one has food; then away to the wild tossing grey water again.