3. Speckled or Variegated.—Spotted with black and white, or white and ash-colour, besides the natural hues. Selby says that Captain Mitford killed one, of which both the wings were white.
4. Bechstein mentions varieties under the name of the Large Bull finch, about the size of a thrush, and the Middling or Common Bull finch. He treats the dwarf variety, which is said to be not so large as a chaffinch, as a bird-catcher's story ; for he observes that this difference of size occurs in all kinds of birds, and says he has had opportunities every year of seeing hundreds both wild and tame, and adds, that he has even found in the same nest some as small as redbreasts, and others as large as a crosablll.
The Bullfinch will produce hybrid young with the Canary.
The native song of this common but pretty bird is very soft and simple, but so law that it is almost inaudible. Its call is a plaintive whistle, and when feeding it fitters a low short twitter. It has how ever acquired great celebrity from the facility with which it learns to whistle musical airs, and from its retentive memory, when well educated and carefully attended to. "Those which are to be taught," says Bechateiu, "must be taken from the nest when the feathers of the tail begin to grow, and must be fed only on rape-seed soaked in water and mixed with white bread ; eggs would kill them or make them blind. Their plumage is then of a dark ash-colour, with the wings and tail blackish-brown. The males may be known at first by their reddish breast ; so that when these only are wished to be reared they may be chosen in the nest, for the females are not so beautiful, nor ao easily taught, though they answer the purpose of call-birds as well as the male." Mrs. Charlotte Smith however says (' Nat. Hiat. of Birds') that she had a nest of bullfinches given her, of which only one was reared : it was a hen, which she kept only because she bad reared it, but the bird hung in the same room with a very fine Virginian nightingale, whose song she soon acquired, and went through the same notes in a lower and softer tone. "Although the young," con tinues Bechstein, " do not warble before they can feed themselves, one need not wait for this to begin their instruction, for it will succeed better, if one may say so, when infused with their food ; since experi ence proves that they learn those airs more quickly and remember them better which they have been taught just after eating. It has been observed several times that these birds, like the parrots, are never more attentive than during digestion. Nine months of regular and continued instruction are necessary before the bird acquires what amateurs call firmness ; for if one ceases before this time, they murder the air by suppressing or displacing the different parts, and they often forget it entirely at their first moulting. In general it is a good thing
to separate them from the other birds, even after they are perfect, because, owing to their great quickness in learning, they would spoil the air entirely by introducing wrong passages ; they must be helped to continue the song when they stop, and the lesson must always be repeated whilst they are moulting, otherwise they will become mere chatterers, which would be doubly vexatious after having had much trouble in teaching them." A single air with a short prelude is generally as much as the bird can learn and remember ; but Bechstein, who asserts this, allows that there are some of them which can whistle distinctly three different airs, without spoiling or confusing them in the least. In truth, as the same author observes, there are different degrees of capacity among the bullfinches as well as in other animals. One young bullfinch learns with ease and quickness, another with difficulty and slowly; the former will repeat without hesitation several parts of a song; the latter will hardly be able to whistle one after nine months' uninter rupted teaching. Those birds which learn with most difficulty are said to remember the songs, when once learnt, better and longer, and rarely forget them even when moulting. To these attractive qualities of the Bullfinch must be added its obedience and capability of strong attachment, which it shows by a variety of little endearing actions ; and it has been known even to repeat words with an accent and tone indicative of sensibility, i4 as Bechstein observes, one could believe that it understood them. Of its attachment the following are instances:— Buffon asserts that tame bullfinches have been known to escape from the aviary, and live at liberty in the woods for a whole year, and then to recollect the beloved voice of the person who had reared them, returning never more to leave her. Others, when forced to leave Hemprich found this species near Mount Sinai, in Arabia ; and there are specimens in the museums of the Netherlands and of Berlin. Tern mine k, from whose work the figures and description are taken, thinks their master, are said to have died of grief. Buffen's story of the return of the escaped bullfinch is corroborated by the amiable qualities ascribed to it by Bechstein, for he says that, among other feats, it may be accustomed to go and return, provided the house is not to near a wood.