THE CHAFFINCH. 199 



on the spectators, lest the attention of the birds should be 

 distracted by their remarks or applause. The contest 

 proceeds as long as the birds continue to utter their notes 

 of defiance, and the victory is adjudged to the one who 

 has the last word. The price paid for a bird of mark, and 

 the pains bestowed on the capture of any bird which in its 

 wild state holds out promise of being an apt pupil, are 

 past belief, and the cruelty practised in producing a j^erfect 

 songster I cannot bring myself to describe. After all, 

 Bechstein's translator says that the notes of the wild 

 Chaffinches in England are finer than any cage ones he 

 has heard in Germany. English bird-fanciers, without 

 going so far as their German brethren, profess to dis- 

 tinguish three variations of song in the Chaffinch. 



The nest of the Chaffinch is an exquisite piece of work- 

 manship, composed of moss, dry grass, fine roots felted 

 together with wool, decorated externally with scraj)s of 

 white lichens, and lined with hair and feathers. It is 

 placed sometimes in the fork of a tree, sometimes against 

 the bole, but more frequently than anywhere else it is 

 built in among the twigs of an apple-tree ; but in every 

 case it is attached to its support by wool interwoven with 

 the other materials. The Chaffinch usually lays five eggs. 



THE BRAMBLmC. 



PRINGILLA MONTIFRINGILLA. 



Head, cheeks, nape, and upper part of the back, black, the feathers Cin winter) 

 tipped with light brown or ash-grey ; neck and scapulars pale orange-brown ; 

 wings black, variegated with orange-brown and white ; rump and lower parts 

 white, the flanks reddish, with a few dark spots. Female— cvovm reddish 

 brown, the feathers tipped with grey, a black streak over the eyes ; cheeks 

 and neck ash-grey ; all the other colours less bright. Length six inches and 

 a half. Eggs yellowish white, spotted and streaked with dark red. 



Little is known of the summer habits of this bird, though 

 in the northern countries, in which it breeds, it must be 

 very abundant, as in winter it occurs over the whole con- 



