F R I N G I L L I D M, 



541 



fly looso with impunity ; it learns the songs of other 

 birds vvitli facility, and has been known to repeat the 

 canary's sonf very tolerably ; one taken old, in the 

 possession of the writer, which has been kept for two 

 or three years in the same eage with several other 

 granivorons bird?, now imitates very accurately the 

 notes of a bulliinc.h, or of his companions. Tnis 

 species breeds readily with the canary. 



HAW Gii)sr,i:A!, (Coccothraustes riifaftris) is the 

 largest, and one of the most beautiful of the European 

 finches. Its length is about seven inches, of which 

 the tail measures two inches and a third. The bill 

 which is extremely powerful, is like a large blunt cone, 

 very thick in proportion to the sr/e of the body, of a 

 dark bluish colour in summer, in both sexes, and 

 pinkish white, or flesh colour, with the tip blackish, 

 in winter. The forehead, in the male, is yellowish 

 brown ; cheeks and crown of the head, light chestnut ; 

 beneath the chin, black, forming a large square spot ; 

 nape of the neck, a delicate ash grey ; back dark rich 

 brown, shaded with grey upon the rump : tail-coverts, 

 light chestnut ; under parts of the body dirty red, 

 shading into whitish about the vent ; the lesser wing- 

 coverts are black, the greater brown behind and 

 whitish before, which forms a pale streak across the 

 \vings ; quills black, tipped with steel-blue, their 

 inner webs having a long white spot, secondaries 

 steel-blue, and terminated with angles so obtuse as to 

 appear as if the tips had been cut olF; tail black, the 

 tips of the two centre feathers shaded with grey, and 

 all the exterior ones are white at the extremity of the 

 inner web. 





Haw Grosbeak. 



All over the plumage of this bird is very soft and 

 silky in its nature, more so than in any other of onr 

 FringilKdef, not excepting even the goldfinch ; and 

 it undergoes no seasonal change, as is the ease with 

 all the others, being equally bright in winter and 

 summer, and the edges of the feathers being per- 

 manent. 



The female has the general tints of the plumage 

 rather duller than the cock bird, and the cheeks, 

 head, and upper tail-coverts are of a greyish chestnut 

 colour. The young, in their nestling plumage, differ 

 from adults considerably, the head arid throat having 

 a strong yellowish tinge ; there is another bar of 

 whitish across the wing, formed by the lesser coverts, 

 being also tinged with brownish white ; the rump is 

 of a brownish cream colour ; from each corner of the 

 mouth proceeds downwards a row of small black 

 feathers, which just trace the outline of what in the 

 old bird is a large black spot ; and the flanks are thickly 

 dotted with transverse oval brown spots, very similar 

 to those upon the breast of a hen missel-thrush ; quill 

 and tail-feathers the same as other adults. 



The haw grosbeak is rare in the British islands, 

 and iu summer is one of the very shyest birds we 

 ha.ve, which has occasioned several writers to speak 

 of it as a winter visitant, though at the same time 

 thi-y were aware of its breeding abundantly in some 

 parts of France ; so that, contrary to all analogy or 

 probability, they described it to migrate northward 

 to spend the winter. It is properly a bird of the 

 woods, and even forests, but so very shy, that in some 

 parts of Kent and Surrey, where it is far from being- 

 very uncommon, it is extremely difficult to get even 

 a distant view of it, and specimens in summer plumage 

 are only to be obtained by very tedious and patient 

 watching. It is entirely a vegetable feeder, subsist- 

 ing chiefly on the various produce of different tree)?, 

 as the kernels and seeds of the beech, elm, ash, and 

 maple ; and in winter of the berries, or rather the 

 seeds and stones, of the juniper, service tree, and 

 whitethorn ; it attacks also cherries and plums, the 

 stones of which, by means of its powerful beak, it 

 breaks with the greatest ease, to feed upon the en- 

 closed kernels. The writer has known, also, a brood 

 of young ones to feed very largely upon green peas. 

 A \\ounded old one, which he kept for some time in 

 confinement, rejected almost everything but hempseed, 

 and invariably refused to feed on haws, the berries 

 from which the species has been named, which seems 

 to indicate that they only resort to those in times of 

 necessity. This bird will become extremejy familiar 

 in confinement, though it is necessary to guard one- 

 self from its powerful beak, with which it can intlicta 

 very severe bite. 



The song of the haw grosbeak is very simple and 

 inward, with but little melody to attract our notice ; 

 it consists of a low whistling, intermixed with some 

 harsh tones, and is audible only at a short distance. 

 The nest is well built, but shallow, formed of sticks and 

 lichens, and lined with fibres of roots and other soft 

 materials. This is placed usually on the upper 

 branches of small trees, and often in the thick top of 

 a pine or other evergreen. The eggs are from three 

 to five, greenish grey, spotted with brown, with a few- 

 streaks of blackish at the larger end. We knew an 

 instance of one of these nests being taken in the fork 

 of a tree, near Richmond Park, Surrey ; and another 

 being placed the following year in the same identical 

 situation. The species is not rare in that neighbour- 

 hood, but upon entering a coppice, the very first bird 

 to take the alarm and flee away is generally the haw 

 grosbeak. The only chance of shooting one in 

 summer is the instant they take their flight from a 

 tree, for they are not to be discovered amid the 

 thick foliage. In winter they congregate in small 

 flocks, and frequent the hedges in bad weather, 

 losing much of their usual wariness. 



There is a species closely allied to the haw gros- 

 beak which inhabits the Indian islands, and another, 

 a very beautiful one, with black and bright yellow 

 plumage, termed C. icterina, in the Himmalaya. 

 North America also possesses one species, and a very 

 characteristic aoocothrmuta, which is described by 

 the continuator of Wilson's Ornithology under the 

 name of 



EVENING GROSBEAK (C. vespcrtlna]. It is a 

 beautiful bird, about eight and a half inches long ; 

 bill greenish yellow ; forehead bright yellow, pro- 

 longed in a broad stripe over the eyes ; head black, 

 shading, as it descends, to olive-brown ; back, rump, 

 and under parts, yellow, brightest upon the rump, 



