16 FRINGILLID^E. 



the spring of the present year (1839), and confirms in 

 various points that which has been here detailed. This 

 young bird was brought from Hampshire at the latter end 

 of March, and was obtained within a few miles of Win- 

 chester. Its whole length is only five inches; the fea- 

 thers of the wings and tail not yet completed ; the former 

 measuring but three inches from the carpal joint to the 

 end, and the tail-feathers only extending five-eighths of an 

 inch beyond the ends of the upper tail-coverts. This bird 

 cannot have flown far from the nest in which it was 

 reared, and was probably hatched about the beginning of 

 March. In the colours of its plumage it very closely re- 

 sembles those observed on young birds of the year when 

 obtained in June, as previously described, namely, the 

 head, neck, upper part of the back, the rump, and all the 

 under surface of the body, greyish white, streaked longi- 

 tudinally with dusky brown ; the feathers of the wings 

 and tail hair-brown, with narrow edges of pale brown ; 

 the beak, though rather long, has both its mandibles per- 

 fectly straight, the lower one just shutting within the 

 edges of the upper, nor is there the slightest indication to 

 which side either mandible would hereafter be inclined. 

 I may here add, that an opinion prevails that the sexes 

 in the Crossbill may be known by the direction of the 

 curves of the mandibles, those of the males turning out- 

 ward in the contrary direction to those of the females ; but 

 the examination of a great many specimens, in reference 

 to this point, has convinced me that this is not a rule to 

 be depended upon, the upper mandible in both sexes turn- 

 ing sometimes to the right and sometimes to the left. I 

 observe a record in the Essex Literary Journal for Janu- 

 ary 1839, that the Crossbill bred in Orwell Park, near 

 Ipswich, in the year 1822. 



