28o FOREIGN FINCHES IN CAPTIVITY. 



corn at Alice. The females usually hide themselves in the sea of 

 herbage, diving to the bottom in a moment, while the males, after 

 occasionally doing battle with each other, or hovering with the peculiar 

 jerking, flapping motion, common to this genus and Chera, over some 

 of the females concealed in the grass, would betake themselves to 

 some elevated head of corn or rush, and thence survey the field. We 

 feel convinced that all the species of the gemis Vidua, and also Chera 

 procne, that we have encountered in South Africa, are polygamous. 

 This may also account for what Mr. Atmore, and others, tell us of 

 the breeding of several females of Estre/da astrild in the same nest." 



According to Ayres (quoted by Dr. Russ) these birds plait together 

 the leaves of a grass tussock, so that the nest thus prepared remains 

 green during the development of the brood. It is curious that none 

 of these travellers have taken the trouble to give full particulars of 

 the nidification, number and colouring of the eggs, &c. 



Illustrations from skins in the Natural History Museum. 



THE YELLOW-BACKED WHYDAH. 



Penthetriopsis macrura, BONAP. 



AN inhabitant of West Africa, from Senegambia to Angola, and 

 crossing to Equatorial Africa and the Lake countries. It is not 

 infrequently imported, and I have seen it partly out of colour at Mr. 

 Abrahams'. A little larger than Penthetria ardens, it has a shorter 

 tail, and altogether is not so strikingly handsome a bird. The male, 

 when in breeding plumage, is jet black, with the mantle, scapulars 

 and lesser wing-coverts bright chrome yellow, remaining coverts edged 

 with tawny, and the inner secondaries with pale brown; below, the 

 axillaries and under wing-coverts are yellowish. Length, including 

 tail, 8J inches; beak and legs bluish black; iris brown. 



In its winter plumage it more nearly resembles the female, but it 



