228 GROSBEAK. 



a dull green stripe passes through the eye, and beyond it, where it 

 is broader; hind part of the head and neck, the back, rump, and 

 wing coverts of the same colour; quills black, edged with green; 

 belly deep grey ; vent rufous red. 



Inhabits Madagascar, and makes a nest of a curious construction, 

 composed of straw and reeds, interwoven in the shape of a bag, the 

 opening beneath ; it is fastened above to the twig of some tree, chiefly 

 such as grow on the borders of streams ; on one side of this, within, 

 is the true nest ; the bird does not form a distinct nest every year, but 

 fastens a new one to the end of the last,* and often as far as five in 

 number, one hanging from another ; these birds build in society, 

 like Rooks, often five or six hundred on one tree, and have three 

 young at one hatch.t 



22— SOCIABLE GROSBEAK. 



Loxia socia, hid. Orn. i. 381. Daud. ii. 397. Paterson's Cape, p. 156. — bird & nest. 



Wood's Zoograph. i. p. 357. pi. 15. Shaw's Zool. ix. 308. 

 Tisserin republicain, Daud. ii. 397. Tern. Man. Ed. ii. Anal. p. lxx. 

 Sociable Grosbeak, Gen. Syn. Sup.W. 192. 



SIZE of a Bulfinch ; length five inches and a half. Bill and 

 lore black ; general colour of the plumage rufous brown, beneath 

 yellow; regions of the ears yellowish ; tail short; legs brown. 



* Perhaps one of the nests in Will. pi. 77. may represent this circumstance. 



t Kcempfer mentions one similar, if not the same, which makes the nest, near Siam, on 

 a tree with narrow leaves and spreading branches, of the size of an apple tree; the nest in 

 shape of a purse, with a long neck, made of dry grass and other materials, and suspended 

 from the ends of the branches, the opening always to the north-west : he counted 50 on one 

 tree, and describes the bird as being like a Canary-Bird, of a dark yellow, and chirping like 

 a Sparrow. — Hist, of Japan, p. 35. 



Fryer also talks of the ingenuity of the Toddy Bird, making a nest " like a steeple, with 

 winding meanders," and tying it, by a slender thread, to the bough of a tree, " hundreds 

 of their pendulous nests may be seen on the trees." 



Said also to build on a tree called Brabb. — Account of India and Persia, 1698. p. 76. 

 These nests are represented in Wood's Zoography, i. p. 355. pi. 14. — about Gullbudda, in 

 Abyssinia, the extremities of the branches of all the lower trees are hung with numerous 

 nests ; the sort of bird not said. — Valentia's Travels. 



