176 ON THE GRENADIER GROSBEAK 
operative with this engrossing occupation, that it 
repeatedly demolished its work and renewed it 
again, varying the direction it gave to the thread as 
the circumstances of the case seemed to require, the 
principal object in view, apparently, being the pro- 
duction of a compact tissue. If supplied with a 
sufficient quantity of thread, Mr. Garside assured 
me that this industrious bird would speedily cover 
the sides of the cage with its ingenious work; and 
so indefatigable was it in procuring materials for the 
prosecution of its labours, which were not restricted 
to any particular season of the year, but were pursued 
even in winter, when it had assumed the garb'of the 
female, that Mr. Garside had been under the ne- 
cessity of removing a beautiful male Wydah bird 
(Vidua paradisea, Cuvier) into another cage, in order 
to preserve the long feathers of its tail from the 
injuries to which they were liable in consequence 
of the incessant efforts of the Grenadier Grosbeak 
to appropriate them to its purpose. When about 
to be attacked by another bird, the Grenadier 
Grosbeak would sometimes interlace the anterior toes 
of one of its feet with the thread, the better to secure 
it, by which contrivance its bill was left at liberty to 
repel the marauder. 
Nothing satisfactory appears to be known con- 
cerning the nidification of this species of Grosbeak. 
If, as Dr. Latham conjectures (‘ Gen. Hist. of Birds,’ 
vol. v. p. 228), it is identical with Kolben’s Finch, 
