Mule 
Breeding. 
(63) 
THE BIRD WORLD. 
Mule Breeding. 
A Lady Amateur’s Experiences. 
By MARGARET E. M. HEWITT. 
Perhaps an amateur’s experiences of 
mule breeding may interest some of the 
readers of the Bird World. 
I turned my attention first to 
Linnet Mules 
as a friend had made me a present 
of a hand-reared Linnet, and I had 
already a young variegated hen Canary 
named “Twitters.” The young couple 
set up housekeeping in one of the side 
divisions of my Crystal Palace aviary, 
and while “Twitters” was building the 
nest, “Taffy,”’ the Linnet, used to 
amuse himself by pulling little bits of 
wool out of the nest to the floor of the 
cage, where, apparently in an ecstasy 
of delight, he would twist round and 
round, fluttering his wings all the time. 
This I thought very pretty and amus¬ 
ing, but I thought differently when, 
after the young birds were hatched, I 
found him playing the same game on 
the sand at the bottom of the cage, 
only this time, instead of a piece of 
wool, he had one of his children in his 
beak, held by the little tuft of grey 
down at the top of its head. 
The Decree Tronounced. 
After this “ Taffy ” had to be removed 
for a time. There was only one cock 
bird in this first brood of four, and a 
very fine fellow he was, very much 
larger than either his father or mother 
or his three plain little sisters, and 
although he was quite an ordinary dark 
Linnet-Mule, he was very much admired 
for his extremely tight, glossy plumage, 
large size and elegant figure. I had 
many more Linnet-Mules after that, 
but none of them equalled “ Hazel ” in 
my affections. Once I was persuaded 
to give 8s. for a Linnet because he had 
been the father of some variegated 
Mules, and the young birds I bred from 
him certainly had a few pure white 
feathers in tail and wings, but such 
slight variegation is rather a blemish 
than an improvement. By far the most 
interesting Linnet-Mule that I ever 
reared is my 
Cinnamon Linnet-Mule , 
which was hatched under the following 
circumstances.—I had long since dis¬ 
carded my Crystal Palace aviary, and 
I had at the time of which I am writ¬ 
ing a bird-room, in which about thirty 
birds flew about at their own sweet will. 
Besides Canaries, Goldfinches, Siskins, 
and Redpolls, I had two Linnets, both 
of which were sold to me as cock birds. 
One of them that I had bought on the 
15 th of July, and had named 
“ Swithun,” was particularly tame, and 
would feed from the hand. I do not 
know its former history, but I should say 
it had very likely been hand-reared. 
The following spring I found it was 
building a nest in a square wooden nest- 
box that was hung up against the wall 
in the bird-room, and, to my surprise 
and delight, it laid five eggs, and sat 
splendidly, only coming off the nest for 
food. This is, I believe, an unusual 
thing for a Linnet to do in captivity. 
I never saw the other Linnet take any 
notice of “ Swithun,” but I began to 
hope that I might succeed in rearing 
some young Linnets, or, possibly, some 
Mules. The eventful day arrived when 
the eggs should hatch, and I hurried 
up to the bird-room to find, lying on 
the window ledge, three young birds 
