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Bird-Song : and New Zealand Song Birds 
.Family: Friegillidae 
THE FINCHES 
Britain has twelve representatives of this family; eight per¬ 
manent residents,—the chaffinch, tree-sparrow, hawfinch, 
greenfinch, goldfinch, lesser redpoll, linnet, and bullfinch; and 
four winter visitors,—the brambling, siskin, mealy redpoll, 
and twite. 
The chaffinch and goldfinch rank fairly high as song birds; 
yet of the chaffinch, so valued for its song in Germany, Yarrell 
merely mentions the song, but does not describe it. Both 
Yarrell and Bolton, too, speak more of the tricks of the gold¬ 
finch than of its song. The chaffinch was a favourite of 
Beehstein, and he describes with some minuteness, in order of 
preference, twelve of the most prized of its songs. Their chief 
attraction appears to be not so much in the melody as in the 
vocalization of the notes, many of them being named after the 
words supposed to be heard in them. It was the vocalization 
rather than the melody, too, that attracted the attention of 
the Maoii in the songs of such birds as the tui; and Garstang 
(GS, p. 39), whilst he makes many interesting and valuable 
obseivations on their music, he says, “the song, rather than the 
music, of birds, is my theme; and song, in birds as in men, 
is indistinguishable in its earlier stages.from rhythmic 
language. In other words, poetry, however elemental it may 
be, lies at the root of all the achievement of avian as of human 
minstrelsy. 7 7 
There is no member of this family native to New Zealand; 
but the chaffinch, goldfinch, greenfinch or green linnet, redpoll, 
and grey linnet, have been introduced and become thoroughly 
naturalized. The twite was introduced, but failed to establish 
itself. 
The usual call of the chaffinch, as heard around Wellington, 
is a lepetition of a single note, chip, chip, or chimp, chimp, as 
