THE CHAFFINCH. 
247 
cotton-mill s, always made use of cotton in the construction of 
their nests. The mills were a quarter of a mile distant from each 
other, and all the nests of these birds erected in the intervening 
plantations, as well as in the immediate vicinity of the mills, ex- 
hibited the foreign product, not only as lining, but exteriorly. 
On remarking to my informant, that its conspicuous colour would 
betray the presence of the nest, and not accord with the theory, 
that birds assimilate the outward appearance of their structures, 
to surrounding objects, he stated, that on the contrary, the use 
of the cotton in that locality might rather be considered as ren- 
dering the nest more difficult of detection, as the road-side hedges 
and neighbouring trees were always dotted with tufts of it. 
Chaffinches feed chiefly on seeds and grain through the winter, 
as proved by my examination of many specimens : — in all of which 
fragments of stone or brick were also found, — the gizzard was very 
strong. Early in the month of May, when a choice of food was 
to be had, I have on different occasions, observed these birds sud- 
denly dart from the branches of trees after flies in the manner of 
the spotted flycatcher. During the winter and early spring, a 
flock consisting of both sexes was observed regularly to frequent 
a merchant's yard situated on one of the quays of Belfast, 
for the purpose of feeding on flax-seed, which was always scat- 
tered about the place : this seed has proved a successful bait for 
taking them in traps. Chaffinches, with other seed-eating birds, 
have been observed in autumn employed in stripping the keys 
from ash-trees ; getting the seed end in their bills, they chop it 
until the contents are dislodged, when the capsule falls to the 
ground* They sometimes congregate in large flocks before winter 
actually sets in : at the end of October I have thus remarked 
them, and occasionally in company with green-linnets. 
There has been much written from actual observation, both on 
the continent and in Great Britain, and from the days of Linnaeus to 
the present time, on the subject of the separation of the sexes of 
chaffinches in the winter. Montagu, writing from Devonshire, says. 
* Poole. 
