PERCHING BIRDS 27 



tail peculiar to the other members of the group. It resembles the whinchat in its 

 fondness for perching on a projecting branch so as to obtain a good view all round, 

 but is equally at home among bushes and tree-tops. In Tunis and elsewhere it 

 keeps to the hills with grassy slopes. The stonechats have also a noteworthy 

 north-west African representative, which ranges into Spain and Italy. This is the 

 black chat (Saxicola leucura), the male of which in the breeding plumage is rusty 

 black in colour, save for the white upper tail-coverts. On account of its handsome 

 plumage, the white portions of which are shown off to the best advantage by the 

 graceful attitudes of the bird, as well as by its liveliness and its melodious song, 

 the black chat is one of the most striking denizens of the rocky country in which 

 it dwells. Another songster of north-western Africa is the melodious warbler 

 (Eypolais polyglotta), distinguished from other members of its genus by the 

 greyish brown legs. Out of Africa, the range of this species includes Italy, Spain, 

 and France. A well-known North African song-bird, which ranges as far north as 

 England, is the furze-warbler (Sylvia unclata), its African representative being 

 distinguished as S. u. toni, while the English bird, commonly known as the 

 Dartford warbler, is termed S. u. dartfordiensis. 



As the sand-larks are represented in northern Africa and south-western Asia 

 by the desert-lark, so the bullfinches have a representative in the desert-bullfinch 

 (Bucanetes githaginea), of which the range extends from the Canaries in the west 

 through northern Africa and south-western Asia to India. On the upper-parts 

 this bird is cream-coloured with a pinkish tinge, and pale pinkish below, while the 

 cheeks and under-parts are pale pink, the feathers of the wings and tail dark 

 brown with pink edges, and the beak pink. These birds, which are rather smaller 

 than ordinary bullfinches, inhabit the most barren parts, and live, except during 

 the breeding-season, in small flocks amid the reddish yellow rocks and sands of the 

 desert, where they would be scarcely noticeable did they not attract attention by 

 their trumpet-like call-notes. Another type of colouring is presented by the 

 canary (Serinus canarius), which is so much like the serin-finch — also indigenous 

 to North Africa — that it has been regarded as specifically inseparable. Although 

 slightly larger, in its winter-plumage it is indeed almost exactly like the serin ; 

 but in summer it develops a yellowish green head, tinged with grey at the back, 

 an olive-brown back shaded with rusty brown and blackish brown streaks, a 

 yellowish green rump, greenish yellow and white under-parts, streaked sides, and 

 blackish brown quills and tail feathers edged with green. The wild canary 

 inhabits the Canary Islands (which really belong to Africa), or at least is found in 

 most of them, and is so common at Las Palmas that the question arises as to where 

 all these birds breed. On the coast of Teneriffe, the breeding-season begins in 

 January, but on the high mountains not till June. The song, although powerful 

 and melodious, is not so varied as that of the domesticated canary, which is 

 descended from the wild bird. 



In the typical finch-group the Algerian finch (Fringilla spodiogenys) is 

 but little different from its well-known European representative the chaffinch. 

 It is, however, grey, not only on the crown, but also on the cheeks ; the yellowish 

 green area extending on to the back, while the under surface is dull white with a 

 delicate reddish tinge. Another species, the Azores finch (F. canariensis), which in- 



