468 Pine Grosbeak and Bohemian Chatterer, 



In addition to the nomenclature above given, the bird is said 

 to be named by the Italians in some localities Becco-Frisone, in 

 others, Galletto del Bosco ; and by the bird-catchers of Bologna, 

 Uccello del Mondo Novo ; by the Germans, Zinzerelle, Wipstertz, 

 Schenee-Yogel and Schenee-Lesclike, and by those in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Niirnberg, Beemerlee and Behemle ; by the Swedes, 

 Siden-Swantz ; and by the Bohemians, Brkoslaw. 



That the Bohemian Chatterer was known to the ancients there 

 can be little doubt ; but a great deal of obscurity prevails as to 

 the names by which it was distinguished. Some have taken it to 

 be the Incendiaria Avis of Pliny (book x. c. 13), the inauspicious 

 bird, on account of whose appearance Piome more than once un- 

 derwent kistration, but more especially in the consulship of L. 

 Cassius and C. Marius, when the apparition of a great owl [Bubo) 

 was added to the horrors of the year. Others have supposed 

 that it was the bird of the Hercynian forest (bookx. c. 47), whose 

 feathers shone in the night like fire. Aldrovandus, who collected 

 the opinions on this point, has taken some pains to show that it 

 could be neither the one nor the other. The worthy Italian grave- 

 ly assures his readers that its feathers do not shine in the night ; 

 for he says he kept one alive for three months, and observed it 

 at all hours ( " qua, vis noctis hora contemplatus sum." ) 



It is by no means improbable that this bird was the gnaphalos 

 of x\ristotle ('Hist. Anim.,' book ix. c. 16). 



The geographical range of the Bohemian Chatterer is extensive, 

 comprehending a great portion of the arctic world. It appears 

 generally in flocks, and a fatality was at one time believed to ac- 

 company their movements. Thus Aldrovandus observes that 

 large flights of them appeared in February, 1530, when Charles V. 

 was crowned at Bologna ; and again in 1551, when they spread 

 throuo-h the duchies of Modena, Piacenza, and other Italian dis- 

 tricts, carefully avoiding that of Ferrara, which was afterwards 

 convulsed by an earthquake. In 1552, according to Gesner, they 

 visited the banks of the Rhine, near Mentz, in such myriads that 

 they darkened the air. In 1571 troops of them were seen flying 

 about the north of Italy, in the month of December, when the 

 Ferrarese earthquake, according to Aldrovandus, took place, and 

 the rivers overflowed their banks. 



Necker, in his Memoir on the Birds of Geneva, observes that 

 from the beginning of this century only two considerable flights 

 have been observed in that canton, one in January, ISOY, and the 

 other in 1S14, when they were very numerous, and having spent 



