The California Linnet 



accommodation to varied conditions. The bird does nest about houses 

 and outbuildings, multitudinously; but the very name House Finch is so 

 often challenged by experiences afield, that one is sooner inclined to call 

 it devil finch or spook finch. Does one penetrate the fastnesses of the 

 cattle country, where the Dalton gang and the James boys used to hold 

 forth, it is to study the mighty Eagle, or to trace the "bullet hawk" 

 (Falco mexicanus) to its ledge. But lo, the "House" Finch has set its 

 little tepee in a cranny beside the noble falcon ; and while the falcon hurls 

 its thunders from the blue, this tedious chit simpers 

 and chirps as though its tiny affairs were nature's 

 chief concern. Does one visit the cliffs at Pizmo to 

 get the salty sting of the gales, or "to hear old Triton 

 blow his wreathed horn," lo! the House Finch has 

 come before. Here upon these storied cliffs, where 

 birds of high and rare degree, Peregrines, Surf-birds, 

 Royal Terns, pause, in passing, to _____ 



greet the shore, these irrever- 

 ent commoners gossip and 

 flutter, or gather straws. 

 Not even the occasional 

 presence of the White- 

 throated Swift, the speed 

 demon of the upper air, 

 daunts these hardy sans- 

 culottes. They, too, dis- 

 port themselves aloft, or 

 wing placidly across 

 some yawning chasm 

 which the sea has cleft, 

 heedless alike of the buffeting 

 wind and of the fretful sea 

 mews. House Finch, indeed! Why, 

 there is no juniper tree where a 

 man may be alone with his Maker, but this bird hops in its branches and 

 twangs his little lute! 



The House Finches nest almost anywhere. If you want a playmate 

 to engage in a state-wide game of hunt-the-thimble, confer with this bird 

 before issuing the challenge. Nests are caught in vines, or placed on tim- 

 bers, under cornices, in bird-boxes, mail-boxes, or in any cubbyhole which 

 an outbuilding offers. Mr. E. C. Mailliard 1 tells of a pair which built in a 

 garage, and which followed the fortunes of its nest while, for experiment's 



1 Condor, Sept., 1917, p. 166. 



Taken in Ventura County 

 Photo by the Author 



NOT VERY HUNGRY. I GUESS 



220 



