White Bengalese. 385 



SHARP-TAILED FINCH (^Munia acuticauda), India. 



Sfennesles acuticauda (Riiss), Alunia kuconota, Amadina acuticauda, Amadina molucca. No English de-xlers' name. 



German name — " Spitzscliwanzige Bronze Amandine." 



The Striated and the Sharp-tailed Finch are both natives of India, Southern China, and 

 Japan. Both birds are so very similar that amateurs can fairly consider them as one species, the 

 more so as our interest in this Finch is chiefly concerned with his progeny, bred in captivity 

 by the Japanese. These little birds are a trifle larger than a Bronze Manakin, but brown 

 on the back. The head is nearly black, the lower body dull wliite. The shaft of each 

 brown feather being white, the plumage appears striated — hence the name. The beak is 

 bluish-black. The feet are dark grey. Male and female are alike. An unpretending, amiable 

 little bird in the aviary, sometimes — but not often — obtainable, and easily kept if fed like the 

 Waxbills. 



Keeping and breeding cage-birds as a pastime or for sale has been practised longer in 

 Japan than in any other part of the world. Whilst our forefathers in Europe began to 

 breed cage-birds only three hundred years ago, the Japanese living three thousand years 

 ago knew quite as well how to breed birds in cages as we do now. Whether it was 

 originally the Striated or the Sharp-tailed Finch from which the Japanese bred the White 

 Bengalese has not been ascertained, and perhaps never will be determined. That it was 

 one of the two is certain. We see the singular result of a breed of perfectly white or mottled 

 little birds being regularly produced, descended from Brown Striated or Sharp-tailed ancestors 

 — another example how birds through cage-breeding may change their colours in the same 

 way as our old friend the Canary has done. Breeding these little white Finches has 

 certainly been practised for centuries in Japan. When and how the change of colour was 

 brought about is not known, but the birds produced may and should be considered as a 

 distinct variety, for they are as different from their ancestors as the Norwich Canary is 

 from his forefather of the Canary Islands. The new species, or white variety of the Striated 

 Finch, is called 



THE WHITE AND VARIEGATED BENGALESE {Mtmia acuticaitda UJ, Munia striata\i^], Japan. (Illustrated.) 



Spermestes acuticauda CRm^^). English dealers' name — White Bengalese. German name — " Japanesische Movchen. " 



French name — "Muscades Blanches," "Bengalis Blancs." 



The Zoological Society appear to have purchased two specimens of the White Japanese 

 variety of Mimia striata in October, i860. I do not remember to have met with any White 

 Bengalese before 1869 or 1870, when I purchased, from a London dealer, the first bird of the 

 Ifind I had seen. In 1871 a number of White and Variegated Bengalese were offered to 

 amateurs by the Zoological Gardens in Antwerp, and since that time these birds have been 

 offered for sale in increasing numbers, so that latterly they are rarely absent from a well-stocked 

 retail bird-dealer's shop. 



The white variety of Japanese Manakin must not be considered as an albino or liisus 

 natures, like the White Blackbird, for the bird has no red eyes, and his progeny is about as 

 certain to be white as the yellow Canary's offspring is certain to be yellow. By continuous 

 cage-breeding, carried on by the Japanese through many generations, and during centuries, a 

 naturally brown-black bird has become pure white, or brown-and-white piebald, or black-and- 

 white piebald. The bill and feet of the Bengalese are pale pink, and this colour indicates, 

 as much as the plumage, the cage-bred origin of the species, for the Striated Finch in his natural 

 state has a bluish-black bill and dark grey feet. 



When these little birds first appeared in the market they created quite a sensation, which, 

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