The Serin 63 



oases." Also, in his notes qnoted by Seebolim (British Birds, Vol. II, p. 85) — 

 " It is a bird that appears to love the richest districts, and we never met with it 

 in the pine- and cedar-forests on the Aur^s. In the oases the birds inhabited the 

 Inxuriant gardens, the groves of fig-trees, and were seen amongst the apricot- 

 trees and wealth of shrubs beautifull_v clothed in the fairest of blooms. But 

 amongst this semi-tropical verdure, the Serin is difficult to see, and you only 

 catch a hasty glimpse of it as it appears on the outermost branches for a moment 

 and then disappears again. 



Amongst the date-palms, however, it is very conspicuous. There is little or 

 no underwood beneath these trees, and the bird perches exclusively upon them. 

 It was seen sitting on the topmost puint of the broad leaves, sixty feet from the 

 ground, whence it occasionally took a little fluttering flight into the air to catch 

 an insect from the swarms flitting round the tree-tops. All the Finches in summer- 

 time are more or less insectivorous, and the little Serin is no exception ; indeed 

 it seems most industrious in its search after insects, not only flitting into the air 

 but occasionally clinging to the stems of the palm-trees, as if searching for its 

 food amongst the rugged bark. We repeatedly saw it, too, upon the tops of the 

 walls that divide the Arab Gardens ; but it was always rather shy, and after a 

 moment or two's rest flew off to its usual refuge, the tops of the date-palms." 



The nest is placed either in a fruit-tree, or some other tree of moderate 

 height, a shrub, or bush ; it is loosely but neatly constructed of bents and roots, 

 compacted together with vegetable down, wool, and spiders' cocoons, or lichen and 

 gre}^ moss, and is softly lined with similar materials. The eggs number from 

 four to five, usually five, and chiefly differ from those of the Siskin, or Goldfinch, 

 in their smaller size, being verj^ pale green, marked with dark reddish-brown 

 blotches, spots, and sometimes lines, and with underlying sienna- reddish spots ; 

 most specimens are principally marked at the larger end. 



The food of the Serin consists chiefly of small seeds, and it is said to give 

 the preference to those of an oily nature : when rearing its young, however, as 

 is the case with other Finches in a wild state, various small insects are also eaten, 

 and doubtless leaves and unripe seeds of weeds. 



The call-note somewhat resembles that of a Canar}-, a plaintive whect, but the 

 song is described by Naumann as more nearly like that of a Siskin ; and Howard 

 Saunders says :— " The song resembles the word zi-zi often repeated, and a flock 

 of birds settled in a tree produces a peculiar buzzing or almost hissing sound." 

 The bird often sings on die wing after the manner of the Siskin. 



The Serin being only subspecifically distinct from the Canary, the fact recorded 

 by Dr. Carl Russ — that hybrids between the two, proved fertile to the third and 



