I20 



Canaries and Cage-Birds. 



mandible. To all these distinct names iiave been appropriated. A superciliary stripe is situated 

 above the eye, occupying a position analogous to that of the human eyebrow. An ordinary eye- 

 stripe is either anterior, posterior, or entire. It is called anterior when it only occupies the space 

 between the eye and the bill ; posterior when it commences behind the eye and advances or 

 unites with the ear-feathers ; and entire when it is both posterior and anterior. A ina.xillary 

 stripe commences at the base of the under mandible and descends on the sides of the neck." 

 We referred, on page 99, to that form of marking which is considered by the fancier to be the 

 correct thing, and which may be seen in the coloured plates, and also to other forms not so highly 

 prized, all of which find their counterparts in the description given above, and which a reference 

 to the subjoined cuts will make sufficiently plain. In Figs. 32 and 33 the anterior and posterior 

 stripes will be recognised, and in Fig. 34 will be noticed a combination of the anterior and 

 superciliary marks, the latter, when it occurs really as a mark and not in an exaggerated form, 



Fig 35- 



Fig. 36. 



being usually very clearly defined in outline. Figs. 35 and 36 represent enlarged forms of anterior 

 and posterior marking, the latter not only advancing towards but uniting with the ear-feathers, 

 where it loses its character and eventually breaks into an objectionable patch, which sometimes 

 almost breaks the heart of the fancier. 



To fix this feature with exactness is the object in view. And is this all .■' No ; there 

 is a corresponding exactness in the marking of the flight-feathers to be secured ; but this 

 is not a matter of so much difficulty, the wings appearing to be much more tractable and 

 open to impression than the much-coveted eye-mark of the fancier. Whether or not our 

 theory as to the probable origin of this mark be correct is, perhaps, not much to our 

 present purpose, but we might say further in its support that this particular form of eye-mark, 

 a long streak from front to back, frequently appears with more or less regularity of form in 

 the most heavily and irregularly variegated birds, which have never in any way been bred with 

 a view to its production, and it will also occasionally appear in lighter strains in which, if any 

 attempt has been made, it has been in the direction of entire obliteration. The fact, also, that there 

 is no fixed strain of Evenly-marked Norwich, and that they are to a very great extent chance 

 productions— nuggets laid bare with the stroke of the pick while delving for other treasures — is 



