66 BRITISH BIRDS. WITH THEIR NESTS AND EGGS. 



with huffish ; beak pinkish-white, with the terminal half of the upper mandible and 

 tip of the lower mandible dark horn-brown ; feet flesh-brown ; iris hazel. In con- 

 finement the beak and feet become paler and more pink in tint. 



The female is usually slightly smaller than the male, has a narrower crown, 

 and a much narrower, straighter, and more regularly tapering beak ; the crimson 

 on the head rarely extends quite so far backward on the forehead and throat ; the 

 cheeks are much more stained with buff-brownish ; the lesser coverts are distinctly 

 browner ; the yellow on the wing is rarely so brilliant ; and the under parts are 

 not quite so pure a white, showing a suspicion of grey when compared with the 

 male. Young birds, known to bird-catchers as " Grey-pates," show no black or 

 crimson on the head, have buffish tips to the wing-feathers, and brownish under- 

 parts, with indistinct spotting on the breast. The general characteristics of the 

 adult birds are acquired after the first moult, but the full beauty of the species 

 is not brought out until after its second moult. 



Birdcatchers always distinguish the sex of the Goldfinch by " the colour of the 

 shoulder," intense black in the male, rusty black in the female : this, however, is 

 not so easy to note in young birds as is the different outline of the beak when 

 seen from above, or the greater arch of the culmen in the male beak when seen 

 from the side. 



Although the Goldfinch does not haunt the interior of thick woods, it frequently 

 hangs about the more open spaces on their outskirts, especially where rank weeds 

 such as thistles, teasels, or plantains abound, upon the seed of which it delights 

 to feed ; but orchards, shrubberies, gardens, and waste patches on badly cultivated 

 ground are its favourite resorts in the summer time; whilst in the winter it 

 wanders throughout the country in small or large flocks seeking for food. A con- 

 siderable number of Goldfinches nevertheless join the stream of migrants towards 

 the south in the autumn months. 



The Goldfinch is certainly much rarer in our islands than it formerly was, but 

 I cannot think even Mr. Swaysland's statement that at one time a boy could catch 

 forty dozen in a morning, or the undoubted fact that birdcatchers would rejoice if 

 they could do so now, will at all account for the great diminution in their numbers ; 

 the continual reckless destruction of all kinds of birds of prey would probably 

 counterbalance the numbers obtained by 'catchers, who only capture sufficient to 

 supply the bird-market, whereas the Merlin, Sparrow-Hawk, Hen-Harrier, and 

 most of the Owls, which are more or less destructive to small birds, pay no 

 attention to close-seasons, but destroy throughout the year. On several occasions 

 bird-catchers have brought me Sparrow-Hawks which have swooped at the decoy- 

 Goldfinch and been caught in the nets. 



