The CARMINE BULLFINCH, or RIBAND FINCH (_Erythrothorax erythrinus_) is six inches long and ten inches across the wings. The wing and tail feathers are deep brown, the upper part of the neck bright carmine, and the breast white, marked with carmine red. The male of a year old and the female resemble the female linnet. The Carmine Bullfinches inhabit woods and districts covered with reeds in the north of Europe and Asia, and are found in great numbers in Sweden, Finland, and Russia. According to Jerdon, this species is also met with as a winter guest throughout India, being seen very frequently in the north, but more rarely in the southern parts of that country, principally inhabiting mountainous districts. "I have," he says, "generally found this bird in the bamboo plantations; indeed, it is called in the Telegu dialect the _Bamboo Sparrow_; it also frequents gardens and thickets, and lives almost exclusively upon the seeds of the bamboo and of various other plants." The Carmine Bullfinch is often captured on account of its agreeable song: Radde met with it on the Steppes and at Baikal, but more frequently on the banks of rivers, and sometimes saw solitary individuals even at an altitude of 8,000 feet above the level of the sea. We are not much acquainted with the habits of this bird, but know that it prefers well-watered or boggy plantations, and feeds upon various kinds of seeds, amongst which we must no doubt include those of reeds, as it is principally met with where beds of the latter are to be found. In its demeanour it reminds us as much of a linnet as of a bullfinch. Its movements are light, its flight undulating, and its call a clear piping note. Blyth tell us that the "Tuti," as this species is called in India, has a weak, twittering, but gentle and expressive voice, the sound of which is something between that of a goldfinch and a linnet, while its call resembles that of the canary. In Kamschatka its notes have been imagined to sound like the Russian sentence, "_Tschewitschu widal--I have seen the Tschewitschu_," the Tschewitschu being a large kind of salmon, which is the most highly-prized fish of that country, forming, as it does, a valued article of food; so that the song of the Carmine Bullfinch is not only looked upon as a herald of spring, but as announcing the blessings that she brings in her train. The nest is built in clumps of willows or canes, and always in the vicinity of water; it is formed of the stalks of plants, straw, or fibrous roots, and is lined with wool or horsehair. The eggs are larger than those of the linnet, and of a green colour, with red spots spread most thickly over the broad end. Tame Carmine Bullfinches are considered great curiosities; whilst writing, however, we are so fortunate as to have a male of this species before us. When it first came into our possession, the autumnal moulting was just commencing, and continued until December, leaving the once beautiful creature with a dull coat.