478 GRANIVOROUS BIRDS. 



houses of the French inhabitants of New Orleans and its 

 vicinity ; and some have succeeded in raising them in 

 captivity, where plenty of room was allowed in an 

 aviary. In England they have been known to build and 

 lay their eggs in the orange trees of a menagerie. They 

 are familiar also in the gardens and orchards, where their 

 warbling notes are almost perpetually heard throughout 

 the summer. Their song much resembles that of the 

 Indigo Bird, but their voice is more feeble and concise. 

 Soon reconciled to the cage, they will sing even a few 

 days after being caught. Their food consists of rice, 

 insects, and various kinds of seeds ; they collect also the 

 grains of the ripe figs, and, frequenting gardens, build 

 often within a few paces of the house, being particularly 

 attached to the orangeries. 



Their nests are usually made in the hedges of the 

 orange, or on the lower branches of the same tree, like- 

 wise occasionally in a bramble or thorny bush. Exter- 

 nally they are formed of dry, withered grass, blended with 

 the tenacious silk of caterpillars, lined with hair, and 

 internally finished with fine fibrous roots. The eggs are 

 4 or 5, white, or pearly, and marked with dark purplish 

 brown spots. In the mildest climates in which they pass 

 the summer, they raise two broods in the season. They 

 are commonly caught in trap-cages, to which they are 

 sometimes allured by a stuffed bird, which they descend 

 to attack ; and they have been known to survive in do- 

 mestication for upwards of ten years. 



The Nonpareil is about 5| inches long, and 8| in alar extent. 

 Back and scapulars glossy yellow, stained with green, and in old 

 birds with red. Tail slightly forked, purplish brown (generally 

 green). Legs and feet leaden-grey. Bill black above, plain grey- 

 ish-blue below. Iris hazel. — Female a little less. — In the waZe, in 

 the 2d season, the blue on the head appears ; in the next year the 



