204 BIEDS OF SOMERSETSHIRE. 



and is mixed with down from the catkins of the 

 willow. 



The Lesser Hedpole is almost, if not quite, the 

 smallest of our Finches. It has the heak yellowish 

 brown, the tip being dark horn-colour ; irides dusky 

 brown ; there is a crimson spot on the forehead at 

 all times of the year ; the rest of the head and nape 

 are light yellowish brown, streaked with dark brown : 

 cheeks and ear- coverts j^ellowish brown ; back and 

 scapulars nearly the same as the head, but a shade 

 darker, and the markings are larger ; on the rump 

 the light markings become nearly white and yellow- 

 ish again on the tail-coverts ; the wing-coverts are 

 dusky brown, tipped with dull brownish white, 

 which in the two sets of wing-coverts make two light 

 bars across the wing ; the quills are dusky brown, 

 very slightly edged with yellowish white ; the tertials 

 are more broadly margined ; tail dusky brown ; chin 

 black; breast and flanks light yellowish brown, 

 streaked mostly on the flanks with dusky ; belly and 

 under tail-coverts nearly white ; legs, toes and claws 

 brown. In spring the breast becomes a beautiful 

 pink, which colour extends itself over the flanks and 

 up the side of the neck nearly to the eye : as the 

 spring advances this colour probably becomes 

 brighter, as Yarrell calls it " vermilion," but the 

 colour on the breast of my bird, killed in 

 March, is by no means so bright as that, nor is it 

 like any of the shades of colour on the breast of 



