FOR CAG2S AND A VlARIES. 79 



The Linnets. See under Linnets. 

 The Mountain Finch. See Brambling. 

 The Pine Grosbeak. See pag. 75. 

 The Redpolls. See under Linnets. 



The Serin Finch. 



This is a rare winter visitor, coming to us now and 

 then in twos and threes from the same quarters as the 

 Siskin, the female of which it greatly resembles, but is 

 more mottled on the breast. 



A few are taken every season, but the bird is little 

 known, except to the initiated. It must be fed and treated 

 like the Siskin, and will breed with it, producing a mule 

 that is larger than either of its parents (probably owing to 

 the abundant supply of nourishing food on which it has 

 been reared) and bearing a general likeness to an ordinary 

 green Canary. 



The male of this species is very like the female, and 

 except that the latter is a little greyer on the back could 

 scarcely be distinguished from it; but small as the differ- 

 ence is, it has been seized upon by some particularising 

 naturalists to constitute her into a distinct species with the 

 name of Citril Finch. 



The Siskin. 



This favourite Finch is, with the exception of the Redpoll, 

 the smallest member of the group, measuring barely 4^ 

 inches in total length, if inches of which are included 

 in the tail. The general colour of the plumage is green, 

 but the male has the top of the head and the throat black ; 

 the rump, breast and under parts are greenish-yellow; the 

 secondaries and wing-coverts are also edged with the same 

 colour. The varieties recorded are the white or buff and 

 black, or a mixture of the above colours. The female has 

 no black on the head or throat. 



When wild, this bird frequents the northern parts of 

 Europe, where pine and fir forests abound, and in them it 



