A group thus occupied I have attempted to represent in the plate. I have at the same time endeavoured to save you the trouble of reading a long description of the changes which take place in their plumage, from the time at which the young leave the nest, until the fourth year following, when the males attain the full beauty of their brilliant livery. Where in fact would be the necessity of telling you more, than that the young, during the first summer, are similar in colouring to the female; that the next spring, the head of the males only has become of a handsome blue; that, the spring following, the same bird is mottled more or less with azure, carmine, yellow and green; and that it requires another return of the warm season before all these colours are perfected and rendered permanent; when at a single glance you can determine all this at once. Long descriptions of this kind are only fit to be read to the blind. Colours speak for themselves.
The flight of the Pape, by which name the Creoles of Louisiana know this bird best, is short, although regular, and performed by a nearly constant motion of the wings, which is rendered necessary by their concave form. It hops on the ground, moving forward with ease, now and then jetting out the tail a little, and, like a true Sparrow, picking up and carrying off on wing a grain of rice or a crumb of bread to some distance, where it may eat in more security. It has a sprightly song, often repeated, which it continues even when closely confined. When the bird is at liberty, this song is uttered from the top branches of an orange-tree, or those of a common briar, and although not so sonorous as that of the Canary, or of its nearer relative, the Indigo Bunting, is not far from equalling either. Its song is continued during the greatest heats of the day, which is also the case with that of the Indigo Bird.
The nest of this pretty bird is generally placed in a low situation, in an orange-tree, frequently within a few paces of the house, or far from it on the edge of the fences, where briars are convenient. It raises two broods each season. The eggs are four or five, of a beautiful pearly, rather bluish colour, speckled with blackish, and are deposited in a simply constructed nest, lined with fine fibrous roots or horse-hair, and externally formed of fine grass. They readily breed in confinement, if their prison is rendered tolerably comfortable. The young are fed at first in the manner of Canaries, but at the end of ten or twelve days are taught to swallow grains of rice, insects or berries. No sooner are figs or grapes ripe than these birds attack them, feeding for some time almost entirely upon them. Towards evening, they also pursue insects on wing.
Some persons give the name of Nonpareil to this species, but it is more commonly known by the name of Pape, which, in fact, is a general appellation given by the inhabitants of Louisiana to all the smaller species of thick-billed birds.
The Painted Finches do not proceed far eastward, nor, indeed, up the Mississippi, being seldom seen above the City of Natchez, on that river, or farther to the east than the Carolinas. It retires southward in the beginning of October.
The Chickasaw Wild Plum, on a twig of which I have represented a group of these birds, is found growing abundantly in the country where the birds occur. It is a small shrub, the fruit of which is yellow when ripe, and excellent eating.
Fringilla Ciris, Ch. Bonaparte, Synopsis of Birds of the United States, p. 107.
Emberiza Ciris, Linn. Syst. Nat. vol. i. p. 313.—Lath. Ind. Ornith. vol. i. p. 416.
Painted Bunting, Lath. Synops. vol. iii. p. 206.—Wils. Amer. Ornith. vol. iii. p. 68. Pl. xxiv. fig. 1. Male; fig. 2. Female.
Adult Male, in full plumage. Plate LIII. Fig 1.