610 FRINGILLID^. 



of its beak, and in other generic characters ; while it agrees 

 with the Crossbills in many of its habits, as well as in the 

 general colouring and changes of its plumage. 



The food of this species is seeds and berries ; it frequents 

 pine forests, builds a nest of small sticks, with a lining of 

 feathers, and usually places it on a branch of a tree, a few 

 feet only above the ground. It lays four or five eggs, one 

 inch one line long, by eight lines in breadth, of a pale 

 green, with a few spots and streaks of purplish brown ; and 

 the young birds are said to be hatched in June. The male 

 has an agreeable song, will sometimes sing at night, and in 

 confinement is said to remain in song nearly the whole of 

 the year. 



The Pine Grosbeak is more abundant in the northern 

 parts of Europe and America than elsewhere, and is found 

 in Sweden, Norway, Lapland, Russia, Siberia, and sparingly 

 in the north of Germany, but more frequently now than 

 formerly. According to M. Vieillot, it is a very rare bird 

 in France, sometimes seen, and then only in winter, in those 

 parts bordering on Germany or Switzerland, where there 

 are abundance of pine forests ; but this bird has been seen 

 as far south as Provence and Genoa. 



North America appears to be the country in which the 

 habits of the Pine Grosbeak have been more attentively 

 observed, and to the recent describers of the birds of that 

 extended region I must refer for particulars. Mr. Audubon 

 has observed them in Newfoundland, on the coast of La- 

 brador, and at Hudson's Bay. In the winter of 1836 these 

 birds were seen as far south as the vicinity of Philadelphia ; 

 and that season also they were abundant in the States of 

 New York and Massachusetts. Sir John Richardson saw 

 them as far north as the 60th parallel. Mr. Audubon, in 

 his extended and valuable Ornithological Biography, says, 

 " The flight of the Pine Grosbeak is undulating and smooth, 



