344 THE CANARY BIkD. 
tint on the flanks, The tail is rather forked, and the feathers are black, 
edged with white. 
THE pretty little CANARY BIRD, so prized as a domestic pet, derives its 
name from the locality whence it was originally brought. 
Rather more than three hundred years ago, a ship was partly laden with 
little green birds captured in the Canary Islands, and having been wrecked 
near Elba, the birds made their es- 
cape, flew to the island and thee 
settled themselves. Numbers of them 
were caught by the inhabitants, and 
on account of their sprightly vivacity 
and the brilliancy of their voice, they 
soon became great favourites, and 
rapidly spread over Europe. 
The original colour of the Canary is 
not the bright yellow with which its 
© feathers are generally tinted, but a 
kind of dappled olive-green, black, 
- and yellow, either colour predomi- 
nating according to circumstances. 
I have kept Canaries for many 
years, and could fill pages with anec- 
dotes and histories of them and their 
habits, but as I have already written 
rather a long biography of my Canaries 
in “My Feathered Friends,” together with instructions for the management 
and rearing of these pretty birds, there is no need to repeat the account in 
the present pages. 
THE SISKIN is hardly to be considered more than an occasianal visitor 
in England, but in Scotland it sometimes breeds, as may be seen from the 
following extract :-- 
“The Siskin is a common bird in all the high parts of Aberdeenshire, 
which abound in fir-woods. They build generally near the extremities of the 
branches of tall fir-trees, or near the 
summit of the tree. Sometimes the 
nest is found in plantations of young 
fir-wood.” In one instance I met with 
a nest not three feet from the ground. 
I visited it every day until four or five 
eggs were deposited. During incu- 
bation the female showed no fear at 
my aporoach. On bringing my hand 
close to the nest, she showed some. 
inclination to pugnacity, and tried to 
frighten me away with her open bill, 
following my hand round and round 
when I attempted to touch her. At 
last she would only look anxiously 
round to my finger without making any 
attack on me. The nest was formed 
of small twigs of birch or heath outside and neatly lined with hair.” Its 
eggs are a bluish-white spotted with purplish red. : 
THE noisy, familiar, impatient SPARROW, is one of those creatures thai 
has attached itself to man, and follows him wherever he goes. . 
Nothing seems to daunt this bold little bird, which is equally at home in 
CANARY. —(Cardueli. canaria.) 
SISKIN.—(Fringillus spinus.) 
