226 FRIXGILLIDiE. 



few d(3,grees to the south in both hemispheres. It is of very 

 rare occurrence in the pine-forests of Scotland, and a still 

 more unfrequent visitor to England. The Pine Grosbeak, 

 or Pine Bullfinch, is a bird of sociable habits, and an 

 agreeable songster. 



THE COM^rON CROSSBILL. 



LOXIA CURVIROSTRA. 



Bill equalling in length the middle toe, point of the lower mandible extending 

 beyond the ridge of the upper mandible ; plumage variegated, according to 

 age and sex, with green, yellow, orange, and brick-red. Length six and a half 

 inches. Eggs bluish white, speckled with red-brown. 



The beak of this bird is pronounced by Buffon " an error 

 and defect of Nature, and a useless deformity." A less 

 dogmatic, but more trustworthy authority, our countryman, 

 Yarrell, is of a different opinion. " During a series of obser- 

 vations," he says,* " on the habits and structure of British 

 birds, I have never met with a more interesting or more 

 beautiful example of the adaptation of means to an end, 

 than is to be found in the beak, the tongue, and their 

 muscles, in the Crossbill." !N"o one can read the chapter 

 of " British Birds " devoted to the Crossbill (in which the 

 accomplished author has displayed even more than his 

 usual amount of research and accurate observation) without 

 giving a ready assent to the propriety of the latter opinion. 

 Unfortunately the bird is not of common occurrence in this 

 country, or there are few who would not make an effort to 

 watch it in its haunts, and endeavour to verify, by the 

 evidence of their own eyes, the interesting details which 

 have been recorded of its habits. I have never myself 

 succeeded in catching a sight of a living specimen, and am 

 therefore reduced to the necessity of quoting the descrip- 

 tions of others, 



* Vol IL p. 22. 



