Our  Canaries 
217 
CHAPTER  XIII. 
REVIEW  OF  BREEDS  AND  VARIATIONS. 
THE  ANCESTRAL  STOCK. 
IT  is  a  curious  fact  that,  notwithstanding  the  great  popularity  of  our  domestic 
songster  from  the  very  earliest  times  of  which  we  have  any  record,  all 
trace  of  its  origin  or  evolution  from  its  wild  ancestors  is  absolutely  lost  in 
obscurity.  Not  a  tittle  of  proof  or  actual  evidence  of  the  identity  of  the  ancestral 
prototype  seems  to  have  been  preserved,  so  that  apart  from  the  legendary  story 
of  the  shipwrecked  refugees  on  the  Isle  of  Elba  (which  is  now  generally  dis- 
credited) nothing  remains  but  the  merest  speculation  and  theory  to  indicate  from 
what  source  has  sprung  the  race  of  caged  pets  now  so  thoroughly  domesticated  as 
to  be  reasonably  considered  a  wholly  artificial  or  man-made  creation,  and  withal 
possessed  of  such  widely  different  characteristics  as  the  plain  but  tuneful  Roller, 
and  the  feathery,  crowned  Crest,  or  the  be-spangled  little  Lizards  and  the  hunch- 
backed Belgian. 
When  we  consider  these  immense  and  wonderful  variations  of  size,  form, 
colour  and  markings,  we  cease  to  marvel  that  able  writers  have  occasionally  been 
inclined  to  the  supposition  that  the  race  originated  from  a  combination  of  more 
than  one  ancestral  type.  But  the  present  difference  in  type,  were  it  even  greater 
than  it  is  to-day,  is  no  criterion  for  the  existence  of  a  dual  stock.  In  the  poultry 
world,  which  it  is  universally  agreed  is  descended  from  a  single  ancestral  stock — 
the  Red  Jungle  Cock  of  India  {Gallus  galliis) — we  have  an  even  greater  variety  of 
types,  as  witness  the  trim  and  fantastic  Rose-combed  and  Japanese  Bantams,  the 
Frizzled  Bantam,  the  monstrous  Cochins  and  Brahmas,  and  the  immense  crests 
of  the  Houdans  and  Polish. 
POSSIBILITY  OF  DUAL  STOCK. 
Reasoning  by  analogy  it  will  thus  be  seen  that  the  striking  divergence  of  type 
in  our  present-day  Canaries  does  not  necessarily  give  the  slightest  support  to  the 
theory  of  a  dual  stock.  It  is  now  generally  conceded  by  the  best  authorities  to 
have,  in  all  probability,  originated  from  a  sub-species  of  the  Serin  Finch  {Serim^s 
serinus),  of  which  several  very  closely  allied  species  exist  on  the  Continent, 
reaching  from  Spain  and  Germany,  through  Switzerland  and  Italy,  to  Greece — 
this  region  embracing  the  earliest  known  birthplace  of  the  cage-bred  singing  bird 
known  by  the  name  of  Canary.  The  particular  sub-species  to  which  we  owe  our 
pets  we  may  never  know,  but  it  is  reasonable  to  assume  that  if  more  than  one  such 
species  shared  the  honour  of  this  creation,  there  is  every  reason  or  believing  that 
two  of  these  Serins — both  sub-species  of  the  same  type  {Serinus  5^nww5)— which 
would  produce  fertile  young  when  mated  back  to  the  parent  stock,  and  also 
