CANARY BIRDS. 79 



business ; and then, again, in the change of 

 cages, very often, indeed, new birds do not 

 know where to look for the food and water. 

 Having once given the new-comers time to 

 get perfectly at home with the room and 

 their owner, and used to the faces and voices 

 of those going in and out, the actual putting 

 into the aviary is generally a very quiet 

 work ; when in a single cage, too, they have 

 wanted so much to be promoted to it ! 



At this moment I have before me, living 

 for a time in a large store cage three feet six 

 inches by eighteen inches deep, a company 

 of twenty birds. The cage at night stands 

 in a passage, and is covered well over with 

 a woollen table-cloth. In the day it stands 

 in a window of my sitting-room on the top 

 of a plant case. A bath, glazed at the top 

 and three sides, is hooked upon the door, the 

 amusement of which is indescribable. Birds 

 emerge at intervals in parties of two or 

 three, and go afterwards to " hang them- 

 selves out to dry " on t^e sunniest perch or 



