512 
GRANIVOROUS BIRDS. 
uncertain. My friend, Mr. Oakes, of Ipswich, has seen 
them in large flocks in that vicinity in winter. With 
us they are rare, though their favorite food is abundant. 
They are by no means shy, and permit a near approach 
without taking alarm, often fluttering among the branches 
in which they feed, hanging sometimes by the cones, and 
occasionally uttering notes very similar to those of the 
American Goldfinch. Early in March they proceed to 
the North, but their summer dress and breeding habits 
are wholly unknown. 
The length of this species is said to be 4 inches; and the alar ex- 
tension 8. Rump and tail-coverts yellowish, spotted with dark- 
brown ; sides, under the wings, cream-color, with long streaks of 
black ; breast light flaxen, with small pointed spots of blackish. Bill 
dull horn-color. Legs purplish-brown. Irids hazel. 
LESSER RED-POLL. 
( Fringilla linaria, Lin. Y^ilson, iv. p. 42. pi. 30. fig. 4. [young 
male.] and ix. p. 126. Phil. Museum, No. 6579.) 
Sp. Charact. — Above greyish, inclined to rufous, and spotted with 
dusky ; below, and rump, pale crimson, approaching to white on 
the vent ; crown deep crimson ; frontlet and chin black ; wings 
and tail dusky ; bill very sharply and slenderly pointed. — Female 
without red on the rump, the throat black ; the breast generally 
whitish ; belly with large dusky spots. — In the young , the space 
round the bill is cinereous, the lower parts pale rufous, and spot- 
ted, with two rufous bands upon the wing. 
This elegant species, which only pays us occasional 
and transient winter visits, at distant intervals, is an in- 
habitant of the whole arctic circle to the confines of Sibe- 
ria, and is found in Kamtschatka and Greenland, as well 
as the colder parts of Europe. Arriving in roving flocks 
from the northern wilds of Canada, they are seen, at times, 
in the western parts of the state of New York with the 
fall of the first deep snow, and occasionally proceed east- 
