they also ate the ants themselves. From the first, however, they

would eat mawseed, also the seeds of various weeds. Their

growth was most wonderfully rapid, as will be seen by the

following dates :


Hatched on July 23rd ; August 5th, full fledged, able to fly

well ; August 13th, the two 3^oung cocks easily distinguishable

from the hens ; August 20th. full grown and almost in full

plumage ; August 27th, young cocks in full plumage, indis¬

tinguishable from the parent, and crowing and calling the hens to

feed.


The precocit}^ of these little birds was most remarkable,

especially in gallinaceous birds, where the assumption of full

plumage (especial^ where the males differ greatly in plumage

from the females) is usually a very lengthy process, spread at

least over some months ; in this bird at five weeks old they were

apparently adult.


A prettier sight than this little family are now can hardly

be imagined. To escape the burning sun of the last few weeks

they have made little runs all through the grass of their lawn,

like those made b3^ colonies of field voles. They have little

seats under tufts of grass, and in looking at the grass nothing

whatever is visible. Suddenly a little head pokes up through

the grass and crows ; then another and another peer out in

different places, and answer ; then they all settle down again,

having assured one another that the3 ? are all there. Occasionally

two sit in the same little form, but usually only one.


I forgot to describe the eggs, which were yellowish stone

colour, covered with small spots and dots of very dark brown.

The eggs were large for the size of the bird.



BREEDING VIRGINIAN CARDINALS.


I.


By the Rev. C. D. Farrar.


Virginian Cardinals are probably familiar to almost all the

readers of the Avicultural Magazine. In almost every bird shop,

at a certain season of the 3^ear, you may see one or two unhappy

cocks of this species, looking extremely sick and sorry.


I11 bu3dng Virginian Cardinals let me give a word of

caution : Buy them as soon after they arrive as possible, as a

very short stay in a dealer’s cage will be fatal, for there the seeds

of consumption will be laid which will sooner or later end the

career of your purchase.



