chap. vi. j BIRDS THAT BREED IN MADEIRA DESCRIBED. 119 



words*: — "It is very familar, haunting and breeding in 

 gardens about the city. It is a delightful songster, with, 

 beyond doubt, much of the nightingale's and skylark's, but 

 none of the woodlark's song, although three or four skylarks 

 in confinement in Funchal are the only examples of any of 

 these three birds in the island, and notwithstanding the 

 general opinion, that such notes are the result of education 

 in the canary. It is in full song about nine months in the 

 year. I have heard one sing on the wing and passing from 

 one tree to another at some distance, and am told that 

 during the pairing season this is very common. Each flock 

 has its own song, and, from individuals in the same garden 

 differing considerably, I suspect that of each nest varies more 

 or less. After the breeding season they flock along with 

 linnets, goldfinches, &c, and are then seldom seen in gardens. 

 An old bird caught and put into a cage will sometimes sing 

 almost immediately, but seldom liv3s longer than the second 

 year in confinement. The young from the nest are difficult to 

 rear, dying generally at the first moult. They cross readily with 

 the domesticated variety, and the progeny are larger, stronger, 

 better breeders, and, to my taste, better songsters also, than 

 the latter ; but a pure wild song from an island canary at liberty, 

 in full throat, and in a part of the country so distant from the 

 haunts of men that it is quite unsophisticated, is unequalled 

 in its kind, by anything I have ever heard in the way of bird- 

 music." 



The Goldfinch is very common, and differs in no respect 

 from our own. 



The Ring-Sparrow here takes the place, in a way, of our 

 house-sparrow. It is universal, on the bleak serras, near 



* Zoological Journal, No. 17, Art. xvii. 



