diligence in hunting their prey. They have a peculiar way of examining the foliage and blossoms rather than the surface of the branches, and their motions are very conspicuous upon the outer parts of the trees near the extremity of the spray. The golden robin hunts his prey like the sylvians, though he is not one of them, and his motions are more rapid and energetic than theirs.

The wren, the creeper, and the chickadee seek their food while creeping round the branches, and take less of it from the foliage than the sylvians or the flycatchers. They seldom pause in their circuitous course, proceeding usually from the junctions of the branches to their extremities, hopping from spray to spray, and then passing to another tree. The sylvians appear to examine the leaves and blossoms, while the creepers and tomtits examine the bark of the tree. Hence the former do not prolong their stay with us after the fall of the leaf, while the other species are seen after the trees are entirely denuded. We may infer, therefore, that the sylvians feed chiefly upon beetles and other winged insects that devour the leaves of trees, while the creepers and tomtits take more insects in embryo, which during autumn and winter are half concealed in the bark of trees.

The habits of the flycatchers differ from those of any of the species above named. Let us take the pewee as an example. He sits on a twig almost without motion, but with a frequent sideling of the head, indicating his watchfulness. He does not seem so diligent as the sylvians, because he waits for his prey to come to him, and seeks for it only by carefully awaiting its approach. That he is not idle is shown by his frequent flitting out in an irregular circuit, and immediately returning to his perch with a captured insect. These salient flights are. very numerous, and he often turns a somerset in the act of capturing his prey. He seldom misses his aim, and

probably collects from ten to fifteen insects of an appreciable size every minute. As he lives entirely upon them, and in summer gathers them for his offspring, this is no extravagant estimate.

The pewee, however, does not catch all his prey while it is flying, but he is usually on the wing when he takes it. If he finds a moth or a beetle upon a leaf or a branch, he seizes it while he is poised in the air. A sylvian would creep along the branch, and when near enough extend his neck forward to take it. The vireos, forming an intermediate genus between the sylvians and the true flycatchers, partake of the habits of each. Some of them are remarkable for a sort of intermittent singing while hunting for their food. The preacher, indeed, seems to make warbling his principal employment. He is never, apparently, very diligent or earnest, and often stops during his desultory exhortations, to seize a passing insect, and then resumes his song.

Woodpeckers reside chiefly in the forest, of which they are the natural guardians; and as the food of their choice is nearly as abundant in winter as in summer, they are not generally migratory. Hence the operations of these birds are incessant throughout the year. As their food is not anywhere very abundant, like that of some of the granivorous birds, woodpeckers never forage in flocks. The more they scatter themselves the better their fare. The woodpeckers bear the same relation to other birds that take their food from trees, as snipes and woodcocks bear to thrushes and quails. They bore into the wood as the snipe bores into the earth, while thrushes and quails seek the insects that crawl on the surface of the ground.

There are several families of birds that take only a small part of their food from trees, and the remainder from the soil or the greensward. Such are all the gallinaceous kinds, larks, blackbirds, and thrushes. It has

been said that the skylark was never known to perch upon a tree. These families are the guardians of the soil. The thrushes do not refuse an insect or a grub that is crawling upon a tree, but they forage chiefly upon the surface of the ground. In the feeding habits of the thrushes, their apparent want of diligence attracts frequent attention; but this appearance is delusive. The common robin will exemplify their usual manner, though he carries it to an extreme. When he is hunting his food he is usually seen hopping in a listless manner about the field. Sometimes a dozen robins or more may occupy one enclosure, but they are always widely separated. Observe one of them and you will see him standing still, with his bill inclined upward, and looking about him with seeming unconcern; soon he makes two or three hops, and then stands a few more seconds with his bill turned upward, apparently idle. Presently he darts suddenly a few yards from his standing-place, and may be seen pecking vigorously upon the ground. If you were near him you would see him pulling out a cutworm, seldom an earthworm, or devouring a nest of insects which are gathered in a cluster.

Blackbirds, though they also gather all their food from the ground, seem to be more industrious. Blackbirds of all species walk. They do not hop like the robin. They seldom hold up their heads, but march along with their bills turned downward, as if entirely devoted to their task. They never seem to be idle, except when a flock of them are making a garrulous noise upon a tree. If a blackbird looks upward, it is only by a sudden movement; he does not stop. After watching a blackbird and a robin ten minutes in the same field, any one would suppose that the blackbird had collected twice as much food as the robin during that time. But this is not true. The difference in their apparent industry is caused partly by

the character of their food. The robin is entirely insectivorous, while the omnivorous blackbird hunts the soil for everything that is nutritious, and picks up small seeds that require a close examination of the ground.

The robin is probably endowed with a greater reach of sight than the blackbird, and while hopping about with his head erect, his vision comprehends a wider space. Many a time have I been astonished at the rapidity with which one of these idle robins would collect cutworms during a dry spell when they could not be very abundant, sometimes bringing two at a time in her bill and carrying them to her young. The robin not only watches for a sight of his prey, but also for the marks upon vegetation that denote the place of its concealment. He must possess an extraordinary share of this sagacious instinct; for the thousands of cutworms destroyed by him could not be discovered except by these indications and when they crawl out at twilight. The robin is therefore one of the earliest as well as the latest feeders among all our birds in the morning and evening.

The foraging habits of the different species of domestic poultry are worthy of remark as illustrating some of the differences observed in the manners of wild birds. Place a brood of ducks in a field during grasshopper-time, and they generally pursue one course, marching in a body over the field with great regularity. A brood of chickens, on the contrary, will scatter, occasionally reassembling, but never keeping close together, unless they are following a hen. Turkeys scatter themselves less than chickens, but do not equal ducks in the regularity of their movements. Pigeons settle down upon a field in a compact flock, and then radiate in all directions. They pursue no regular march, like ducks.

A very interesting class of foragers are those that feed in compact assemblages. This habit renders the snow

buntings exceedingly attractive. Their food is not distributed in separate morsels like that of robins and woodpeckers. It consists of the seeds of grasses and of composite plants, which are often scattered very evenly over a wide surface. When, therefore, a flock of fifty or more settle down in a field, each one fares as well as if he were alone, during the short time they remain on the spot. Insect-feeders find it for the most part profitable to scatter and keep separate, because their food is sparsely distributed. This is not true of the birds that frequent the salt-marshes that are overflowed by the tide. Their aliment consists of insects and worms which are evenly scattered and abundant. Hence sandpipers and some other species forage in flocks, though they live exclusively upon an animal diet.

The swallow tribes are the guardians of the atmosphere, that would otherwise swarm with fatal quantities of minute insects. Their foraging habits are observed by all, and are well known. Woodpeckers, creepers, and chickadees are the guardians of the timber of the forest; sylvians and flycatchers, of the foliage. Blackbirds, thrushes, crows, and larks are the protectors of the surface of the soil; snipes and woodcocks, of the soil under the surface. Each family has its respective duties to perform in the economy of nature; and man must beware lest he disturb this equilibrium by reducing the numbers of any species below the supply of insects which is afforded them.

It is curious to note the assiduity with which insects. are hunted in all stages of their existence. In their larva state, those that lurk inside of the wood and bark are taken by woodpeckers, and those under the soil by snipes and woodcocks. Insects, when the larva has assumed the form of moths, beetles, and flies, are attacked by flycatchers and sylvians and other small birds that take their food by day, and by small owls and whippoor