PURPLE FINCH 



A WANDERING MINSTREL 



{Figs. 32, 33) 



HEN a company of Purple Finches 

 patronize oun feeding-stand, our 

 garden seems bright with color and 

 cheery with song. It is as though 

 all the English Sparrows had been 

 dipped in red ink or streaked be- 

 low with dusky and taught to sing. 



In some parts of the west and southward into 

 Mexico, the House Finch or Linnet, a near relative 

 of our Purple Finch, seems as much at home in the 

 heart of large cities as though he were an English 

 Sparrow. It is most surprising to see a brightly col- 

 ored male perched on a telegraph wire above a 

 street thronged with vehicles, singing his flowing, 

 musical warble seemingly with as much pleasure as 

 though he were in a blooming apple orchard. 



Unfortunately our eastern bird is not so fond of 

 the haunts of men. Usually he is but a voice in the 



air. We hear his flight-call, "Creak, creak," as he 



80 



