THE CORDON BLEU.
Estrilda phcenicoiis, SwAlKS.
f ^ H I S little bird, whicli is also known as tlie Crimson-eared Waxbill, is largely
imported and consequently in spite of its great beauty, is obtainable at a very
reasonable rate. It inhabits Senegambia to the Gaboon, N.E. and Eastern Africa as
far soutli as the Zanzibar district; Equatorial Africa aud the Congo River. The
male above is of a mouse-bro-wn colour, with the lower back and upper tailcoverts
of a bright cobalt blue ; the tail, Prussian blue ; the cheeks, throat and breast
cobalt blue, this colour also extending along the sides of the bodj'; the ear-coverts
bright crimson, forming a crescentic patch ; centre of breast, abdomen, thighs, and
under wing and tail-coverts pale mouse brown ; the flight feathers above and below
dull bro-vTO ; length 4 inches. Beak, crimson ; legs flesh-coloured ; iris 3rellowish ;
feathers encircling eye slightl}' paler than on the rest of the face.
The female chie% differs from the male in the Avant of the crimson ear-patch.
In its wild state, according to Heuglin :—" This delicate little bird lives in
Abyssinia up to 7000 feet above the sea level, in Takar, Senaar, on the White Nile,
aud in Kordofan : it is nowhere exactlj' abundant, does not, like its relations, collect
into large companies, but is mostly seen singly or in pairs, both in thorn-hedges about
villages and farm-holdings, and in forest region, especiallj- in the vicinit}' of water
courses. It is a resident bird and incubates in extremely peculiar nests, which if
casnall)- examined, have no distinct form and appear to hang in a bush like little straj'
heaps of straw; they are also loosely placed between knots and twigs, or in hedges
generally at a height of from 4 to 8 feet. The exterior of the entire completed nest
consists of fine dr}' straw stalks, the points of which usually run inwards in a definitely
oblique direction towards the top ; a little concealed sloping opening leads into the
vei-j' elegant nest-cavit3^, which is lined with grasses, feathers and wool. Before, after
and during the rainy season, I found in them from three to six pure white somewhat
cylindrical eggs, which wdien incubated became opaque and milky." He then proceeds
to tell us that the Granat-Astrild, like Urohjicha cantans, also uses the residences of
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