195 



to the gardener and the agriculturist, its food con- 

 sisting principally of the seeds of various sorts of 

 weeds, such as thistles, groundsel, plantain, chick- 

 weed &c. ; the young birds are for a time mostly fed 

 upon caterpillars and other insects.* In confine- 

 ment they may be kept on the same food as the 

 Canary, but always show a great partiality for 

 green food and wild seeds. 



The nest is a very pretty, neat structure, quite as 

 neat as that of the Chaffinch : it is placed in low, 

 thick bushes, sometimes evergreens, and occasion- 

 ally in apple-trees : it is made of grass, fine roots, 

 moss and wool, and lined with willow>down, feathers 

 and hair : if it is supplied, even in its wild state, 

 with anything better suited to its purpose it will 

 make use of it.t 



The Goldfinch, as I said before, is the brightest 

 and gayest-coloured of all our Finches : it is some- 

 what smaller, and more slender in form, than the 

 Chaffinch. The beak is nearly white, the point dark 

 horn-colour ; irides dusky brown ; forehead, and all 

 round the base of the beak as far as to the eye, 

 crimson ; top of the head, and a circle at the back of 

 the cheeks and ear-coverts, black ; cheeks and ear- 

 coverts dull whitish brown ; there is a lightish spot 

 on the nape ; back, rump and scapulars yellowish 



* Yarrell, vol. i., p. 568. 

 f Id., p. 567. 



