The GOLDEN-CRESTED WREN (_Regulus cristatus_, _flavicapillus_, or
_auricapillus_) is yellowish green on the mantle, and light grey beneath;
the throat is whitish grey; the crown of the head is saffron yellow,
its sides golden yellow, decorated with a black stripe; the wings are
enlivened by two light-coloured bands. In the plumage of the female
all the tints are duller, and the yellow on the head paler than in her
mate. The young are entirely without the bright colouring on the head.
This species is three inches and two-thirds long, and five inches and
five-sixths broad. The wing measures one inch and five-sixths, and the
tail an inch and a half. The Golden-crested Wren is the only member
of this family found in Scandinavia, and it also breeds as far south
in Europe as Greece, but is seldom seen in Spain. Notwithstanding the
apparent delicacy of these birds, they are capable of sustaining an
unusual degree of cold, and great numbers pass the entire winter in
the pine forests of Sweden. In England and Ireland they also remain
throughout the whole year, but we are told that those living in the
Orkneys wander as far as the Shetland Isles when the cold sets in. A most
extraordinary circumstance that took place in 1823 is related in the
Memoranda of the Wernerian Society, namely, the total disappearance of
the whole race of these birds, natives as well as strangers, throughout
Scotland and the north of England. This happened towards the end of
January, a few days previous to the continued snowstorm that was felt so
severely in the northern counties of England and the eastern parts of
Scotland. The range and route of this migration are unascertainable, but
it was most probably a distant one, from the fact of not a pair having
returned to breed or pass the succeeding summer in the situations they
had been known always to frequent; nor was one of this species to be
seen till the following October, about the usual time for our receiving
an annual accession of strangers to our indigenous birds. Like their
congeners, these tiny, delicate Wrens principally frequent fir and
pine forests, about the branches of which they scramble with wonderful
agility, hanging head downwards from the twigs, or darting like meteors
from branch to branch, in a restless and incessant search for the insects
upon which they subsist. Their voice is gentle and twittering, and their
song occasionally uttered as they hover in the air over a bush or shrub.
During the period of incubation, which frequently commences as early as
February, the males endeavour to attract the attention of their future
partners by spreading the beautiful crest upon their heads, and indulging
in a variety of animated and excited movements, as they hop or fly about
the spot where the desired mate is perching. The nest is spherical,
usually placed at the extremity of a branch, beautifully constructed of
moss or lichen, and in most instances snugly lined with feathers, cotton
wool, or down from plants. The eggs, from six to ten in number, have a
pale reddish white or yellowish white shell, finely spotted with red,
and are scarcely larger than peas, not exceeding six lines in length,
and five in diameter. So voracious are the young, that Colonel Montague
observed the mother come thirty-six times in an hour with morsels for her
craving family, and continue her labours without intermission for sixteen
hours in the day. Mr. Selby tells us that he has seen fully-fledged young
by the end of April.