THE MOUNTAIN FINCH.
Fringilla montifringilla, Linnæus; Le Pinson d’drdenne, Buffon; Der Bergfink, Bechstein.
This bird is six inches and a quarter in length, of which the tail measures two and a half and the beak half an inch; this is yellow, with a black tip. The feet, nine lines high, are dark flesh-coloured; all the feathers of the head and cheeks are black with reddish edges, wider and more distinct in young males, and becoming fainter from age, almost disappear in old ones, whose heads become quite black; the tail rather forked, and black.
The colours of the female are more uniform; she is brown where the male is black, and only a rusty colour where he is red.
Independently of the varieties produced by age, and which are tolerably numerous, without being very remarkable, there are some more remarked, such as those with a white head, a back quite white, &c.
Habitation.—In their wild state this species is scattered throughout Europe; however, it is most probable that in the summer they only inhabit the northern parts. During the three other seasons they are found everywhere in Germany, particularly where there are large forests. When beech-mast is plentiful in Thuringia the mountain finches assemble in immense numbers, it is supposed more than 100,000.
In the house they are kept in a cage or not, according as they are esteemed; where they are common they are not thought worthy of one, but allowed to range at will.
Food.—Wild, and in confinement, it is the same as the chaffinch’h.