3708 Birds. 



those birds throughout the summer, under favourable circumstances ; but perhaps the 

 extreme haste they showed to build, and the pertinacious pursuit of their object under 

 difficulties, is worthy of note. Being desirous of obtaining some siskin's eggs for my 

 cabinet, I procured a pair of birds, the first week in May last. On the 12th I turned 

 them into a small aviary, which I fitted up with the freshly-cut tops of two spruce-fir- 

 trees, about five feet in length, and partly covered the bottom with turf and moss, leav- 

 ing the rest gravel. They were furnished with old nests of the stonechat, lesser white- 

 throat, lesser redpoll, chaffinch, bullfinch, and wren, in order that they might have an 

 extensive choice of materials. Two days after, I discovered that they had begun to 

 build ; and on the 21st, having observed that the hen bird had been, for the last day 

 or two, often seated on the nest, now completed, I examined it, and found it to con- 

 tain two eggs. On the 25th, there being five eggs, I removed them, together with the 

 nest, at the same time inserting more materials, as before. Two days after, they began 

 again to build, in exactly the same situation as before; and on the 1st of June the 

 nest contained an egg. I waited for some days, to allow the hen to begin to sit, aud 

 then removed five eggs, substituting those lesser redpoll's which were partially incu- 

 bated. These the hen siskin immediately began to brood ; and in due time they were 

 hatched ; but, alas ! hurriedly run-up houses do not last long, whether men or birds 

 be the builders ; and the increasing weight of the young redpolls broke through the 

 bottom of the nest ; and when they were precipitated on the ground, their foster- 

 parents took no notice of them : accordingly they perished. Nothing daunted, how- 

 ever, the siskins again summoned their energies, and built a third nest, but so badly, 

 that had it not been for the intervention of a kind friend of theirs, who placed a plat- 

 form of moss as a support to it, a similar disaster must have occurred ; and about the 

 last day of June a single egg was laid. No other being added to it, it was removed 

 on the 3rd of July, and a bullfinch's, which was the only egg of any of the Fringil- 

 lidae then to be met with, substituted. On this the hen siskin sat steadily, and with a 

 devotion worthy of a higher reward ; but in about three weeks' time, no young bird 

 appearing, hope and patience forsook her, and she her nest. The three nests are now 

 before me. The first is composed of green moss intermixed with small twigs, stems 

 of grass, and rabbit's down, and lined with the last-mentioned material, and one or 

 two feathers: it is clumsily and untidily constructed ; it is about four inches in out- 

 side, and two inches in inside, diameter, and about one inch deep. The second is 

 built of much the same materials as the first, but with scarcely any green moss, and 

 a much greater quantity of grass-stems ; it has a neater, though flimsy, appearance, 

 and more resembles that of the lesser redpoll than did the first. The third is much 

 smaller and more compact than either, more feathers are used in its construction, and 

 the whole fabric better woven, but badly built withal. The eggs are all of a greenish 

 white ground-colour, some being spotless, and others marked with rust-colour, either 

 in well-defined dark spots about the larger end, or cloudily dispersed over the whole 

 surface. They differ a good deal in size, the last-laid specimen being perhaps half as 

 large again as some of the others. In shape they are rather elongated. As far as I 

 had an opportunity of judging, they would all have produced chicks. — Alfred Newton; 

 Elveden Hall, Thetford, October 7, 1852. 



Siskin (Fringilla spinns) Breeding in Ireland. — On Thursday last, the 22nd of 

 July, I observed a female siskin at the entrance-gate to Powerscourt Waterfall, Co. 

 Wicklow. Tt appeared as familiar as the robin, allowing me to approach within a few 

 yards of it. Must not this bird have bred there ? I know some people are sceptical 



