146 OUR IRISH SONG BIRDS. 



flapping wing, uttering its song all the while, and, making 

 a circuit, returns to the vicinity of its starting-point 

 again, reminding one something of the way in which a 

 cock pigeon will fly off with a loud, clapping noise from 

 the roof-top, when he wishes to make a good impression 

 upon the lady of his choice. 



The Greenfinch is said to be the most readily tamed 

 of all our songsters ; after a few lessons it will sit upon 

 its owner's finger, and readily take its food from his 

 hand. The term Coccothraustes, " berry-breaker," or 

 perhaps " grain-crusher," has been given to this bird 

 and to the Hawfinch alone of our British birds, from 

 their strength of bill, and the use they make of it, con- 

 fined, in the case of the Greenfinch, mainly to the 

 husking of the seeds upon which it feeds. 



The Greenfinch builds a pretty nest ; according to 

 Mr. Seebohm, "slovenliness is the secret of its beauty ;" 

 it is found in ivy, in a bush, laurel or evergreen, and in 

 it the eggs are laid, usually five in number, of a greyish- 

 or bluish-white, speckled with purple or brown. It is 

 said that some hybrids of this bird with the common 

 Linnet may occasionally be seen wild; and we know 

 that in confinement it is frequently mated with the 

 canary. 



As a proof of the tameness, or rather " tamableness," 

 of the Greenfinch, to which I have previously alluded, I 

 may mention Mr. Thompson's narrative of certain 

 young Greenfinches taken at Fort William, near Belfast, 

 kept for some little time, and then given their liberty. 

 " In the evening they as regularly returned to their cage 

 to roost, as in a wild state they would have done to 

 their favourite tree or shrub." 



