28 Mr. J. H, Guruey — Comparative 



Passeres. 



In the order Passeres, 24 years seems to be about the 

 maximum in confinement^ and only five in the list reach that, 

 but six others get as far as 20. Several have lived long enough 

 to refute Brehm's opinion that the smaller singing-birds 

 can scarcely live more than ten years. Mr. Meade-Waldo's 

 pair of Erythrospiza githaginea even produced and reared 

 22 young ones in one season when they were twelve years old, 

 an instance of what skill and care can do with cage-birds in 

 a country far colder than their own. As to how long the 

 F asset esc^wXviQ in a wild state we are quite in the dark, and 

 must remain so apparently, none of those in my list being 

 wild ones. 



Dr. A. G. Butler has succeeded in keeping the following 

 Weaver-birds for about nine years : — Fouclia madagascar- 

 iensis, Nesacanthis eminentissima, Quelea russi, Q. quelea, 

 Pyromelanafranciscana, and P. afra, and they were all two or 

 three years old when he first had them. Many other small 

 cage-birds have also been kept for about the same period by 

 Dr. Butler and other bird-fanciers. The Raven's attribute 

 of long life dates to early times and has given rise to some 

 amusing stories. On the Faeroe Islands is an old saying : — 

 " A human being lives as long as three horses, a Crow as long 

 as three human beings, but a Raven as long as seven Crows."" 

 Willughby says their reported age exceeds all belief, ''yet," 

 he adds, " doth it evince that these birds are very long-lived" 

 ■ — having, it may be, in his mind the Greek poet Hesiod, 

 who averred that a Raven would live nine times as long as a 

 man. But neither Francis Willughby nor Bacon nor 

 KJEerboUing, who says " Ravens in confinement have lived 

 over 100 years," gives verified cases. Montbeillard is one 

 who says it seems well ascertained that Ravens sometimes 

 live a century or more, adding that in many cities of France 

 they have been known to attain to that age : probably an 

 assumption from the circumstance of a pair of them, pre- 

 sumably the same individuals, continuing to haunt one rock 

 or one eyrie for an indefinite number of years, which is 

 absolutely no proof. 



