THE AMADUVADE WAXBIIJ,. 113 



more brilliant at breeding-time, and afterwards again duller, even to 

 plain grey ; the beak always remains red. In the dealers' cages males 

 and females always become darker, and sometimes almost entirely dark 

 brown up to the red croup. Flying freely in the bird-room, or in a 

 cage placed in a bright light, they recover their original colouring. 

 If the claw-nails are not cut from time to time, they become monstrously 

 long ; what is more, the beaks sometimes become distorted." 



" Male and female utter a charming, variable trill, but the latter 

 only, as a rule, when there is no male present." 



" Courting : The male hops round the female in a singular manner, 

 with elevated head and expanded tail. A 7 cst rarely in a Hartz cage, 

 almost invariably free in a bush, on the top of a wire-cage or in similar 

 contrivances. In one case a suspended, tolerably deep, overarched bag 

 of strips of paper and bast, horsehair, cotton threads, &c., with one or 

 two exits, and lined with cotton and hair ; in another case a large 

 extraordinary piled up heap of the same building materials, with broad 

 only half-covered cup. Laying almost invariably four eggs. During 

 incubation the male drives every other bird from the vicinity of the 

 nest. Nestlino-doivn clear grey-yellow, waxy skin-glands (expansions of 

 edges of mandibles), white. Young plumage uniform dull brownish, 

 distinguishable from the regularly placed dirty yellow dots on the 

 points of the wing-coverts and the yellow-red croup ; beak shining 

 black. The change of colour commences in the third week, when the 

 beak and whole under surface of the body get brighter and the upper 

 surface darker. After, eight weeks, or thereabouts, the beak is red and 

 then the Tiger-finch (German trivial name) is fit to go to nest. 

 Altogether, the variations of colour are so changeful, that the lovely 

 plumage described is first fully perfected after two years, during which 

 time the feathering is perpetually changing in all parts, through 

 yellow, brown, white into different hues, until the lovely red mantle 

 and the white spots show up sharply. 



" Nevertheless, the Tiger-finch may be recognized at all times and 

 is purchased in all these plumages. Nesting-season : Autumn (Sep- 

 tember) to January ; three to four broods. By removing the means of 

 nesting, also not difficult to breed in our spring and summer months. 

 First bred by Dr. Bodinus, then in Cologne. Whilst the Tiger-finch 

 readily and without difficulty nested in my bird-room, other breeders 

 complain that, under favourable conditions, it never got so far as a 

 hatch ; or, if this came to pass the young would die, and meanwhile it 

 would be quarrelsome. It is therefore, not always bred in proportion 

 to the attempts, and rarely with satisfactory results." 



K 



