In conclusion I will present the reader with some things that have been said in regard to this extraordinary bird by Wilson, which may be of some consequence to those who may regard its value as a cage-bird.

"As it is of some consequence to be able to distinguish a young male bird from a female, the following marks may be attended to; by which some pretend to be able to distinguish them in less than a week after they are hatched. These are, the breadth and purity of the white on the wings, for that on the tail is not much to be depended on. This white, on a full-grown male bird, spreads over the whole nine primaries, down to, and considerably below, their coverts, which are also white, sometimes slightly tipped with brown. The white of the primaries also extends equally far on both vans of the feathers. In the female, the white is less pure, spreads over only seven or eight of the primaries, does not descend so far, and extends considerably farther down on the broad, than on the narrow side of the feathers. The black is also more of a brownish cast.

"The young birds, if intended for the cage, ought not to be left till they are nearly ready to fly; but should be taken rather young, than otherwise; and may be fed, every half hour, with milk, thickened with Indian meal; mixing occasionally with it a little fresh meat, cut or minced very fine. After they begin to eat of their own accord, they ought still to be fed by hand, though at longer intervals, and a few cherries, strawberries, &c., now and then thrown in to them. The same sort of food, adding grasshoppers and fruit, particularly the various kinds of berries in which they delight; and plenty of clean, fine gravel, is found very proper for them after they are grown up. Should the bird at any time appear sick or dejected, a few spiders thrown in to him will generally remove these symptoms of disease."

This remark I have found to be amply verified in my own experience. Indeed, I have observed that all the Turdinæ are greatly benefited while confined in cages, by an occa

sional relish of the common house spider. This insect seems to act in some way medicinally upon many varieties of birds, and even the finches are occasionally benefited by them. Of the song and peculiar habits of the mocking bird Wilson

says:

"In measure and accent, he faithfully follows his originals. In force and sweetness of expression he greatly improves upon them. In his native groves, mounted on the top of a tall bush, or half-grown tree, in the dawn of dewy morning, while the woods are already vocal with a multitude of warblers, his admirable song rises pre-eminent. Over every other competitor the ear can listen to his music alone, to which that of all others seems a mere accompaniment. Neither is this strain altogether imitative. His own native notes, which are easily distinguishable by such as are well acquainted with those of our various song-birds, are bold and full, and varied seemingly beyond all limits. They consist of short expressions of two, three, or, at the most, five or six syllables; generally interspersed with intonations, and all of them uttered with great emphasis and rapidity; and continued with undiminished ardor for half an hour, or an hour, at a time. His expanded wings and tail, glistening with white, and the buoyant gaiety of his action, arresting the eye, as his song most irresistibly does the ear, he sweeps round with enthusiastic ecstasy-he mounts and descends as his song swells or dies away; and as my friend Mr. Bartram has beautifully expressed it, 'He bounds aloft with the celerity of an arrow, as if to recover or recall his very soul, expired in the last elevated strain.' While thus exerting himself, a bystander destitute of sight would suppose that the whole feathered tribe had assembled together, on a trial of skill; each striving to produce his utmost effect; so perfect are his imitations. He many times deceives the sportsman, and sends him in search of birds that perhaps are not within miles of him; but whose notes he exactly imitates. Even birds themselves are frequently imposed on by this

admiral, and are decoyed by the fancied calls of their mates; or dive, with precipitation, into the depths of thickets, at the scream of what they suppose to be the sparrow-hawk."

It is one of the most striking of the exulting attitudes of this bird described by Bartram and Wilson above, that my wife has selected for her figure of the Southern varietyfor upon the question of the existence of the two varieties, my mind has long been distinctly made up in spite of the opinion expressed by Mr. Wilson, and coincided in by Audubon.

Wilson says upon this subject

"Many people are of opinion that there are two sorts, the large and the small mocking bird; but after examining great numbers of these birds in various regions of the United States, I am satisfied that this variation of size is merely ac cidental."

As the purpose of this volume is not to include technical controversies, I shall waive any further discussion of this question for the present-merely giving it as my decided opinion, that what I have named the Kentucky mocking bird is a distinct variety from what I have called the Southern mocking bird.

CHAPTER III.

THE SHRIKE OR BUTCHER BIRD.

Ir is worth while to say something more in detail about this same butcher bird before we dismiss him. The people who always have a reason for a name, have very properly called the little wretch butcher, for butcher he is in the very worst sense of the term!

I specially wish to attract attention to some curious coincidences between the apparent place of this bird on the scale of animal life, and that last of all creatures with which it would seem possible at first view to institute a comparison at all-I mean the humming bird. Now do not be startled --but hear what I have to say! The humming bird is known as the apparent link between insects and birds. There is a moth so closely resembling it, which is found all the way South from Pennsylvania-that it requires an acute observer to distinguish one from the other at the distance of a few feet when they are feeding from the flowers, which they do in the same way.

Now the shrike is quite as evidently the connecting link between the raptores or hawks, and song-birds, as the humming bird is the link between the song-birds and insects! The shrike resembles the hawk in its thirst for carnage and manner of stooping upon its prey, except that, as it has not strong claws like the hawk, it strikes with its strong beak. It resembles the mocking bird so closely in plumage, that older naturalists than I was at sixteen, have frequently con

Its general color is the

founded the habits of the two. same-they both have the white bar across the wings, and the difference consists mainly in the outline of the formwhich in the shrike expresses compactness and strength, with short wings and tail, while in the mocking bird it expresses airiness, with graceful length and elegance of plumage-but the difference cannot be easily distinguished when the shrike is on the wing. There is another point of resemblance to the mocking bird, which is still more remarkable. Audubon asserts roundly, that the shrike can imitate the cries of birds, such as sparrows and other little people, so perfectly, that not only are we deceived, but the sparrows themselves, thinking it is one of their own kith and kin screaming in the claws of the hawk, flock thither in sympathetic terror, from their coverts, when the cunning mocker pounces upon one of them sure enough.

Audubon in his Biography of Birds, says:

"This valiant little warrior possesses the faculty of imitating the notes of other birds, especially such as are indicative of pain. Thus it will often mimic the cries of sparrows and other small birds, so as to make you believe you hear them screaming in the claws of a hawk; and I strongly sus pect this is done for the purpose of inducing others to come out from their coverts to the rescue of their suffering brethren. On several occasions I have seen it in the act of screaming in this manner, when it would suddenly dart from its perch into a thicket, from which there would immediately issue the real cries of a bird on which it had seized. On the banks of the Mississippi, I saw one which for several days in succession had regularly taken its stand on the top of a tall tree, where it from time to time imitated the cries of the swamp and song-sparrows, and shortly afterwards would pitch down like a hawk, with its wings close to its body, seldom failing to obtain the object of its pursuit, which it would sometimes follow even through the briars and brambles among which it had sought refuge. When unable to