292 BIRDS OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 



white ; incubation lasts about seventeen days, and in five or 

 six weeks the young come out of the nest fully fledged, but 

 grey and insignificant-looking creatures with dusky bills. 



Unless they have plenty of room in which to exercise, 

 the females are apt to become egg bound, and die before 

 their unfortunate predicament is discovered. 



Advice that was recently given respecting them by an 

 " expert " that they were not to be allowed seed, but fed 

 entirely on fruit, quickly resulted in the death of the un- 

 fortunate bird subjected to the experiment. The same 

 " authority " also stated that the painted finches were in- 

 different to cold ! which, seeing that they are found 

 chiefly in North Australia, would be decidedly singular if 

 it were correct ; but it is not, as amateurs liavc found to 

 their cost, for owing to their living in single pairs, and 

 not in flocks, they are not imported in large numbers, 

 and the price, although lower than it was, remains high, 

 say, fifty shillings a couple. 



The Parsox Fin'CII is another member of the family 

 that is very well known to amateurs in England, although 

 less frequently in the market than it used to be. It is 

 rather smaller than the diamond sparrow. Its general 

 colour is brown, with the head and neck bluish grey ; a 

 black band crosses the throat, and another passes behind 

 the thighs : the under tail coverts are white, and the tail 

 bluish black. 



It breeds freely in English aviaries, but the 3'oung 

 rapidly deteriorate in size and colour, as well as in stamina, 

 so that an aviary-bred parson finch of the fourth genera- 

 tion is still a desideratum, and likely to remain so, unless 

 the bird can be kept under conditions more nearly re- 

 sembling those that obtain in its native country than is 

 usually the case. Price, about twenty to twenty-five 

 shillings a pair. Food and treatment like the preceding. 



