Our Green Birds. 53 



him quite an acquisition to our select circle of canaria, 

 where his striking ajDpearance makes him ever the 

 observed of all observers. 



It was again a long time before we could find a 

 spouse fit for so beautiful a bird. Many were the visits 

 we paid to the market, many were the peeps we took at 

 the bird-shops, ere we could meet with a hen to our 

 liking. At length, however, we met with one quite 

 accidentally, as we were passing by the arches under 

 the railway station on the London Road, where my ear 

 was suddenly attracted by the well-known '' sound as 

 of many waters," from a hundred little German throats, 

 and which told me that a fresh arrival of canaries had 

 taken place. Soon I espied a window full of those little 

 wooden cages in which these charming songsters are 

 annually imported into this country, and below them 

 one or two apparently English-bred birds, which induced 

 me to enter. The place was stifling hot, being pur- 

 posely so kept by means of a stove, in order to make 

 the German birds maintain a continual gush of song 

 during the short time their wandering proprietor might 

 stay, but which, I need scarcely say, is a practice no 

 less contrary to nature than it is injurious to the bird, 

 and the cause of much complaint and disappointment 

 to the purchaser. The effect already produced on some 

 of the English birds was plainly perceptible, and many 

 of them looked languid and drooping, from the great 

 heat to which they were exposed. Among them, how- 

 ever, were two birds which, from their colour, I par- 

 ticularly desired to possess, one of which was a green 

 hen, exactly answering the description of bird we 



