THE HAWFINCH. 43 



every time that the more powerful bird attacked him ; so that at length the 

 blundering bully came to consider that discretion was the better part of valour. 



I found that a pair of Greenfinches in an aviary built in an ordinary nest-box 

 hung upon the wires, building and feeding exactly as a Canary would; but not 

 attempting to incubate until the third egg was deposited: they not only hatched 

 all their eggs, but brought up their family without one failure. 



In the winter, especially in severe weather, this bird may readily be caught in 

 the ordinary cage-trap, especially if a decoy bird is placed in the cage, and a few 

 sunflower seeds upon the platform. The larger Grosbeaks are all fond of these 

 seeds, and it is no uncommon sight in spacious gardens to see the ripe sunflower 

 heads covered with Greenfinches busily at work extracting every seed. 



I once knew two old ladies who were great breeders of Canaries : on one 

 occasion I called upon them to try and obtain a cock bird for breeding purposes ; 

 and, seeing that they had paired a Greenfinch and hen Canary in one of their 

 cages, I asked why they were trying to breed such ugly unremunerative mules. 

 They replied that their stock was getting weak, and they always introduced Green- 

 finch blood when their birds were falling off" in vigour, and then bred out the 

 taint, pairing the mules with Canaries. This has been supposed an impossibility ; 

 yet it was spoken of as a matter of course. Since then other mules, said to have 

 been bred from hybrids, paired with either parent stock, have been exhibited at 

 the Crystal Palace. 



Family FRINGILLIDAL. Subfamily COCCOTHRA USTIN^E. 



THE HAWFINCH. 



Coccothramtes vulgaris, PALLAS. 



THIS extremely ungainly bird is distributed over nearly the whole of Europe ; 

 breeding in Russia as far northwards as St. Petersburg, but only visiting 

 Scandinavia in the winter; its range extends eastwards to Asia Minor, and the 



