248 FOREIGN FINCHES IN CAPTIVITY. 



THE JAVA SPARROW. 



Munia oryzivora, LINN. 



PEAKING as an aviculturist, I should have preferred to call this 

 O Finch Padda oryzivora : it is, to my mind, quite unlike a typical 

 Munia, in colouring both of body and bill, in the swollen base to the 

 upper mandible of the male (which is far more defined than in Munia) 

 in its clear song, with liquid trills, and in its more Weaver-like 

 courtship. Unlike the true Mannikins, its claws are not incessantly 

 growing too long, and thus endangering its life in an aviary. The 

 home of the Java Sparrow, also known as the Rice or Padda bird, is 

 in the islands of Java, Sumatra and in Malacca ; but it has been 

 introduced into many other countries, and thriven there amazingly. 

 Being abundantly imported into Europe, and not difficult to breed 

 when crossed with white blood, the Java Sparrow is usually one of the 

 cheapest species in the bird-market. 



The prevailing colour of the Padda-bird is soft pearl-grey, the 

 primaries, excepting at their outer edge slaty-grey ; upper tail-coverts 

 and tail-feathers black ; head black to the nape, a broad patch of pure 

 white on the face and cheeks, which, however, is sometimes entirely 

 lost in a single moult,* abdomen dove-grey, almost ashy ; thighs and 

 under tail-coverts white ; tail below black. Length 5! inches. Beak 

 rosy pink, paler at the tip, legs rose-pink ; eyelid red, iris chestnut. 



The female is usually a little smaller than the male, and (as Mr. 

 Abrahams has pointed out) has a narrower, more tapering beak, less 

 swollen at the base. 



Owing to the carelessness of taxidermists in labelling skins, when 

 both sexes are given to them to prepare simultaneously, these 

 differences sometimes appear to be fallacious ; but anyone who has 

 kept and bred Java Sparrows, can readily detect an error, involving 

 the transposition of the sexes. It is in this way that the scientific 

 ornithologist is handicapped : he feels compelled, in all cases where 



* Mr. Abrahams tells me that this is due to the bird having been pecked on the face by its 

 companions. This is just the opposite to what one would have expected to occur, but it only 

 shows that all rules have exceptions. A.G.B 



