24 Birds I Have Kept. 



enthusiastic fanciers going so far as to distinguish some twenty 

 distinct varieties of song, or "melodies", such as the double 

 trill of the Hartz; the Brautigam, or bridegroom's, and the 

 lleiterzong, or rider's song. 



The Chaffinch is quick at learning, and will repeat part 

 of the Canary's and even of the Nightingale's song, but is 

 always interpolating, often at the wrong point, its own sharp 

 note ''pink, pink." It is a hardy bird, and providing it is 

 occasionally supplied with flies and other insects, will live 

 for many years in the house : instances are given of its having 

 survived for eighteen or twenty years in a cage. 



The chief aff'ections to which this bird is subject in a state 

 of captivity are the pip, an obstruction of the rump-gland, 

 from insufficient opportunities for batliing: this complication 

 will be readily diagnosed by the bird continually turning round 

 to peck itself just above the insertion of the tail feathers, when 

 the obstructed gland must be relieved by fomenting it with 

 hot water, piercing the little yellowish tumour with a fine 

 needle, and gently pressing out its contents of inspissated oil. 

 Diarrhoea is occasionally brought on by allowing the bird to 

 drink impure water, or to eat too much succulent green food, 

 siich as rank chickweed: in which case a pinch of chalk, or 

 better still, of aromatic confection in its water will efi'ect a 

 speedy cure. Should the diarrhoea, however, be a symptom 

 of consumption, induced by confining the bird to a poor diet, 

 the disease and its most prominent symptom may be relieved, 

 and often cured by a regimen of insects; but should the dis- 

 order have existed for any length of time, there is no cure, 

 the case is hopeless. 



