GROSSBEAKS. 43 



in a stately manner, feeding in the walks, many 

 times in the day ; and seemed disposed to breed in 

 my outlet ; but were frightened and persecuted by 

 idle boys, who would never let them be at rest.* 



Three grossbeaks (loxia coccothraustes) appeared 

 some years ago in my fields, in the winter ; one of 

 which I shot. Since that, now and then, one is oc- 

 casionally seen in the same dead season. f 



* Specimens have been killed at different times in this 

 country, and instances are recorded of their having even bred ; 

 the species, however, can only be placed among our occa- 

 sional visitants. The specimen from which the figure in Mr. 

 Selby's elegant Illustrations of British Ornithology was drawn, 

 was taken on the coast, near Bamborough Castle, Northum- 

 berland. Colonel Montague mentions a pair that began a 

 nest in Hampshire, and Dr. Latham records a young hoopoe 

 shot in the month of June. The species is abundantly met 

 with in the south of Europe ; it also occurs in Holland, Ger- 

 many, Denmark, and Sweden. In the winter it retires to 

 Asia and Africa, where it is also a permanent resident. 

 W.J. 



One specimen was shot in the county of Dublin, and another 

 in the county of Tipperary, in 1828. LOUDON'S Magazine. 

 W.J. 



f This also can only be placed as an occasional visitant, 

 appearing most frequently in the southern counties of England, 

 during hard and stormy winters. Mr. White (as we learn 

 from the Naturalist's Calendar and Miscellaneous Observa- 

 tions, published in a separate volume, since the author's decease, 

 by Dr. Aikin, and to which we shall occasionally refer) met 

 with this species at different times, and found it feeding on 

 the stones of damson plums, which still remained on and 

 about the trees in his garden. This species forms the type 

 of the genus coccothraustes. " On the 14th May, 1828, the 

 nest of a hawfinch was taken in an orchard belonging to Mr. 

 Waring, at Chelsfield, Kent. The old female was shot on 

 the nest, which was of a slovenly loose form, and shallow, not 

 being so deep as those of the greenfinch or linnet, and was 

 placed against the large bough of an apple-tree, about ten feet 

 from the ground. It was composed externally of dead twigs 



