39*5 Ca.varjes axd Cage-Birds. 



countries the Java Sparrow is as common as our Field Sparrow, and the immense (locks 

 which then feed in the rice-fields do considerable damage. The natives of Java try to 

 diminish this damage by frightening the Java Sparrows with a contrivance similar to the one 

 used in a simplified form by English gardeners to protect seeds from the sparrows. Strings, 

 to which pieces of paper or rags are attached, are stretched all over the field. In the midst 

 of the rice-fields a small elevated hut is constructed with bamboo-poles, and from this hut all 

 the strings radiate. A native placed in this hut keeps all these strings, rags, and papers 

 continually in motion, and thus watches over the safety of his rice-crop. But the Java 

 Sparrows fatten for all that when the rice is in the fields, and are then sometimes eaten. 

 During that part of the year when the rice-fields are under water, the Paddy-bird lives on 

 other seeds and a few insects. 



No foreign Finch is so generally known as the Java Sparrow. When the first 

 specimens may have reached Europe is impossible to tell, because every writer speaks of the 

 Rice-bird as a well-known cage-bird, and very large numbers have been exported from Java 

 ever since Europeans visited that island. In appearance the Java Sparrow is rather hand- 

 some, and especially remarkable for the very perfect condition in which the bird will always 

 maintain his plumage. The soft slate-coloured body-feathers are ever as close as they can 

 lay, the large white patches on the cheeks are ever clean, the black face and throat shine 

 like new velvet, and the rather large wax-like beak is pink, like a doll's cheek, and looks as 

 if just modelled by a wax-worker. 



No foreign bird is kept as easily as the Java Sparrow, for as a rule he will touch nothing 

 else but canary-seed, and live on that for years in perfect health and splendid condition. 

 A cold temperature does not affect this Finch at all, an open-air aviary is as good winter 

 quarters for him as a warm room. About equal in size to our House Sparrow, the Java 

 Sparrow is somewhat clumsy in his movements, and notwithstanding his handsome plumage, 

 he is devoid of the peculiar charm of the smaller foreign Finches. In the aviary Java 

 Sparrows are only safe when the room is large, for if smaller birds should incommode this 

 very peaceful-looking bird, he will freely use his powerful beak, and spitefully bite little legs, 

 which sometimes get broken. When kept in a cage by themselves, Rice-birds are somewhat 

 dull and uninteresting. To breed them is not worth while, for to do so successfully is 

 extremely difficult, and the birds when bred are scarcely of any value. 



One other quality, besides their great frugality, recommends the Java Sparrow to amateurs, 

 and that quality is docility. One of these birds kept for some time in a sitting-room can 

 easily be taught all sorts of little tricks, such as feigning to be dead, standing on his head, 

 &c. To be a pet and plaything of a lady in her boudoir seems to me the proper place 

 of the Java Sparrow amongst foreign cage-birds. But the lady must not mind being pinched 

 sometimes in her fingers by her pet. The song of the Java Sparrow will not disturb an 

 invalid, a few chirps and an attempt of a faint warble being the alpha and omega of his 

 musical performances. Male and female are alike. Young birds display the pure white 

 patches on the cheeks only after the second moult, and old writers mistook young birds with 

 dark cheeks for females. 



The white variety of the Java Sparrow is another instance of a total change of a bird's 

 colour by cage-breeding, and due, like the production of White Manakins, to the persever- 

 ance and ability of the Chinese and Japanese. How the change of colour was brought about 

 will perhaps never be known. Some writers relate that the Chinese keep Java Sparrows 



