THE CHAFFINCH. 
657 
delicate fabric is begun with moss, lichen, and grass- 
bents, and is perfected and lined inside with hair and 
feathers. The eggs are laid at the end of April: they 
are four or five in number, pale blue, spotted with 
blackish brown. At the end of thirteen days' incu¬ 
bation the female, unaided in this duty by her partner, 
has the pleasure of welcoming her callow brood to life 
and light. Now, indeed, there is plenty of work for both 
parents, and the requirements of the nestlings in the way 
of food leave the male scarcely leisure enough to pipe his 
joyous ditty. However, whatever is commenced with 
zeal must end in happiness, for barely ten or twelve days 
after the youngsters are hatched they are in a condition 
to leave the paternal mansion, and look to themselves in 
a life of freedom. Father and mother feed and watch 
over them still for some time after they have flown, and 
then leave them to their fate. 
The parents, however, have not yet fulfilled their 
duties for this year. After a short rest they prepare to 
build a second nest and rear another brood; and if 
they are fortunate with this family, and the weather is 
favourable, they will sometimes rear a third brood. Inas¬ 
much as the old birds nourish their young exclusively on 
insects, of which they destroy immense numbers, their 
utility is self-evident, and even after breeding time the 
family prefer insect food to any other; and as the latter 
consists of oleaginous seeds, principally those of weeds, 
the Chaffinch cannot be regarded otherwise than as 
useful to mankind. 
In some places Chaffinches are caught in large numbers 
and eaten in bushels, like larks, and are productive of 
some profit; but in my opinion the benefits they render 
us in other ways cannot be expressed in words, and far 
