Birds. 5515 



Carte has carefully compared his with specimens procured in 

 Britain. 



Thomas Blakiston. 



Camp, Woolwich, January 24, 1857. 



Notes on a Female Brambling (Fringilla montifringilla). — This specimen was shot 

 in the month of February, when in company with chaffinches, in the neighbourhood of 

 Shanklin, Isle of Wight. Length 6 inches : chin white ; throat ferruginous, as well 

 as the breast, which is tinged with orange and pale red ; a patch of bright lemon on 

 the sides and beneath the wings, the feathers on the spurious wings being tipped with 

 orange; there is also a patch of light chocolate about the vent, which, being in strong 

 contrast to the white of the abdomen, is very remarkable; there are also longitudinal 

 dark hair-brown spots on the feathers between the vent and thighs, as well as on the sides ; 

 the quills are, for the most part, margined with yellow on the outer webs, as are the 

 tail-feathers, more particularly the two centre ones, which are ash-gray on the outer 

 webs, dusky black on the inner; from the fourth to the ninth quill inclusive there are 

 white spots on the outer webs near the shafts, forming, when the wing is extended, a 

 slight bar across it, most of the white being concealed by the primary coverts; the 

 third quill is longest, the first and second are about the same length, the fourth an 

 eighth of an inch shorter than the third. It is not my intention, nor is it necessary, to 

 enter into a minute description of the plumage of the brambling, my object being 

 merely to show in what respect the specimen under examination seems to differ from 

 those mentioned by ornithologists about to be referred to, although I am aware that 

 much variation is said to exist in the plumage of individuals of this species. As my 

 remarks are exceeding the limits I had proposed to myself at their commencement, I 

 shall not venture to give lengthened extracts, as the authors about to be cited can be 

 consulted, if required. Cuvier, in a masterly manner, at once points out what is most 

 remarkable in the plumage, namely, the patch of lemon-colour beneath the wing, 

 which I bad in vain sought for in the descriptions given by other naturalists; but 

 neither Cuvier nor any other author that I have been able to refer to says one word 

 about the peculiarly striking patch of pale chocolate near the vent. 



Cuvier, ' Kegne Animal,' tome i. p. 386 : — " Poitrine fauve, le dessous de l'aile d'un 

 beau citron." 



Temininck, 'Manuel d'Oruithologie,' tome i. p. 360: — "La femelle devant du 

 cou et poitrine dun roux orange clair." 



Pennant (quoting Mr. Johnson) : — " The throat is white, the breast and belly 

 waved with flame-colour. At the setting on of the wings, gray." 



Montagu, 'Supplement to the Ornithological Dictionary:' — "Female. Chin and 

 throat dirty while: upper part of the breast crossed by a band of dull chestnut, above 

 which the feathers are pale, tipped with dusky, giving a speckled appearance to that 

 part ; the rest of the under parts sullied white." In describing the male (in the ' Dic- 

 tionary') he states that only " on three or four of the primaries a spot of white runs 

 through the whole of the exterior web." 



Macgillivray, vol. i. p. 336: — "Female has the throat and breast light reddish 

 brown, the sides paler and unspotted, the abdomen and under tail-coverts brownish 

 white , The third quill longest, the second scarcely shorter." 



Stark (quoting Selby), ' Illustrations,' pi. 54, fig. 8: — "Throat, front of the neck, 



