262 
FRINGILLA TRISTIS, 
fragments of shrimps, minute shell fish, and broken 
limbs of small sea crabs. Its flesh, also, as was to be 
expected, tasted of fish, or was what is usually termed 
sedgy. Amidst the recesses of these wet sea marshes, 
it seeks the rankest growth of grass and sea weed, and 
climbs along the stalks of the rushes with as much 
dexterity as it runs along the ground, which is rather 
a singular circumstance, most of our climbers being 
rather awkward at running'. 
The sea-side finch is six inches and a quarter long, 
and eight and a quarter in extent ; chin, pure white, 
bordered on each side by a stripe of dark ash, proceeding 
from each base of the lower mandible ; above that is 
another slight streak of white ; from the nostril over 
the eye extends another streak, which immediately over 
the lores is rich yellow, bordered above with white, 
and ending in yellow olive ; crown, brownish olive, 
divided laterally by a stripe of slate blue, or fine light 
ash ; breast, ash, streaked with buff ; belly, white ; 
vent, buff coloured, and streaked with black ; upper 
parts of the back, wings, and tail, a yellowish brown 
olive, intermixed with very pale blue ; greater and 
lesser coverts, tipt with duil white ; edge of the bend 
of the wing', rich yellow; primaries edged with the 
same immediately below their coverts ; tail, cuneiform, 
olive brown, centred with black ; bill, dusky above, 
pale blue below, longer than is usual with finches ; 
legs and feet, a pale bluish white ; irides, hazel. Male 
and female nearly alike in colour. 
SUBGENUS II. CARDUELIS , BRISSON. 
175 . FRINGILLA TRISTIS, LINNAEUS AND WILSON. 
YELLOW BIRD, OR GOLDFINCH. 
WILSON, PLATE I. FIG. II. — ADULT MALE, IN SPRING DRESS. 
EDINBURGH COLLEGE MUSEUM. 
This bird is four inches and a half in length, and 
eight inches in extent, of a rich lemon yellow, fading 
into white towards the rump and vent. The wings 
