A NEW BIRD.
We may now, I think, feel confident that those engaging birds, the crossbills, are quite permanently established in England in considerable numbers. One colony is already nesting. In the past they have been curiously erratic, have come over in gangs of considerable size one year and almost disappeared—at any rate from some quarters—the next year, and perhaps for years after. Probably we have to thank the new afforestations for helping to persuade the crossbill, which is a bird of the conifer, to " stay put." They are the earliest nesters we have, though now and again precocious robins, or even pheasants (which suffer strange abnormalities) may anticipate them. But the crossbills, being wedded to evergreens, are not compelled to wait for real spring ; and this February many naturalists will resort to many haunts to watch them nest.
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