14 INTRODUCTION. 



glance at a few examples, chiefly domestic ; since to give any thing 

 like a general view of this subject of the architecture employed by 

 birds would far exceed the narrow limits we prescribe. And here 

 we may remark, that, after migration, there is no more certain 

 display of the reveries of instinct than what presides over this 

 interesting and necessary labor of the species. And yet so nice are 

 the observable gradations betwixt this innate propensity and the 

 dawnings of reason, that it is not always easy to decide upon the 

 characteristics of one as distinct from the other. Pure and unde- 

 viating instincts are perhaps wholly confined to the invertebral class 

 of animals. 



In respect to the habits of birds, we well know, that, like the 

 quadrupeds, they possess, though in an inferior degree, the capacity 

 for a certain measure of what may be termed education, or the power 

 of adding to their stock of invariable habits, the additional circum- 

 stantial traits of an inferior degree of reason. Thus in those birds 

 who have discovered, like the faithful dog, that humble companion 

 of man, the advantages to be derived from associating round his 

 premises, the regularity of their instinctive habits gives way, in a 

 measure, to improvable conceptions. In this manner our Golden 

 Robin (Icterus baUimora) or Fiery Hang-Bird, originally only a 

 native of the wilderness and the forest, is now a constant summer 

 resident in the vicinity of villages and dwellings. From the de- 

 pending boughs of our towering Elms, like the Oriole of Europe, 

 and the Cassican of tropical America, he weaves his pendulous and 

 purse-like nest of the most tenacious and durable materials he can 

 collect. These naturally consist of the Indian hemp, flax of the 

 silk- weed {Asdejnas species), and other tough and fibrous sub- 

 stances : but with a ready ingenuity he discovers that real flax and 

 hemp, as well as thread, cotton, yarn, and even hanks of silk, or 

 small strings, and horse and cow hair, are excellent substitutes for 

 his original domestic materials ; and in order to be convenient to 

 these accidental resources, a matter of some importance in so tedious 

 a labor, he has left the wild woods of his ancestry, and conscious 

 of the security of his lofty and nearly inaccessible mansion, has taken 

 up his welcome abode in the precincts of our habitations. The 

 same motives of convenience and comfort have had their apparent 

 influence on many more of our almost domestic feathered tribes ; 

 the Blue-birds, Wrens, and Swallows, original inhabitants of the 

 woods, are now no less familiar than our Pigeons. The Cat-bird 

 often leaves his native solitary thickets for the convenience and 



