60 Birds I Have Kept 



time in a cage: one of these birds that belonged to a relative 

 of mine was known to be twenty years old when it passed 

 into my possession, and I kept it for four years longer; nor 

 was it until a few months before its death, in the twenty- 

 fourth or fifth year of its age, that its powers began to fail ; 

 then it began to scatter its food, and could not shell the 

 seed provided for it, appearing to lack the necessary strength, 

 so the seed was regularly soaked for it over night, and it 

 was also given bread and milk sop, upon which it subsisted 

 for a time, together with a morsel of sponge-cake, continuing 

 to sing up, almost to the very last. 



Green food is indispensable to keep these birds in health, 

 let some people say what they will to the contrary, but of 

 course it must be administered judiciously, fresh and in small 

 quantities until the birds have become re-accustomed to it. 



The Goldfinch generally builds in orchards, and occasionally 

 in gardens, as I have already stated. I once saw a nest of 

 these birds in the top of a clump of mimosa in the Melbourne 

 Botanical Gardens, but cannot say whether the young were 

 successfully reared; though as the Sparrow has become accli- 

 matised at our Antipodes, as well as the Lark, it is not 

 improbable that there are now Australian Goldfinches too. 

 It makes the nicest nest, after the Chaffinch, of any of our 

 English birds, selecting the very topmost branches of the tree 

 for the purpose. The foundation of the little structure is 

 moss, and fibres, it is covered outwardly with grey lichens 

 and cobwebs, and lined with wool, hair, and the pappus of 

 various seeds; the eggs are from four to six, and bear a 

 general resemblance to those of the Canary, being spotted, 

 especially at the larger end, with rusty red and brownish 

 black on a bluish green ground. 



If intended to be reared by hand, which is much better 

 than taking them when full grown, the young Goldfinches must 

 be removed when about ten days old, and fed on soaked stale 

 bread, soaked summer rape, and finely crushed and sifted 



