BULLFINCH 
123 
and a little hair or feathers. Four or five is the 
usual number of the eggs, which are of the 
general Linnet type, bluish or greenish-white in 
ground-colour, dashed, streaked, and spotted with 
reddish-brown. The name of the bird is descrip- 
tive of its single, chirping call-note, while the 
Latin title calls attention to its yellow bill. 
BULLFINCH. 
(Pyrr/iula europaea,) 
Hoop, Olph. — This is a beautiful bird, with his 
black head, tail, and white-barred wings, so 
strongly contrasted with his clear grey back and 
bright pink cheeks and breast. As we see him 
upon the wing, slipping with his mate along the 
tall brambly hedgerow in dipping flight, the 
most conspicuous point about him is the white 
patch above the tail, which seems, like the rabbit^s 
white scut, to show the way to his companion as 
he flits through the shadowy places. This white 
signal-flag seems to make him the woodland 
counterpart of the Wheatear of the open downs, 
which has an exactly similar adornment. The 
bull-like thickness of the neck, which has given 
the bird his name, also gives him a very distinctive 
and characteristic appearance , but in spite of the 
