BIRDS OF MINNESOTA. 289 



The city hall, in the noisiest part of a city of 150,000 people, 

 has niches in the cornice which they occupied for many years, 

 until the pugnacious little English Sparrows arrived and drove 

 them gradually out and occupied them themselves. My near- 

 est neighbor, Hon. R. B. Langdon, has encouraged their 

 building in the corners of his elegant residence for several 

 years, and our elms, maples and evergreens bear good testi- 

 mony to where the nesting of this species has been in the 

 recent years gone by,* 



The nest is composed of weeds, dried grasses, fine roots and 

 other similar materials compacted in mud, and is lined with 

 fine grass, weeds and horse hairs. Its location varies in eleva- 

 tion from a crotch in a lilac bush, two feet from the ground, to 

 the tops of trees sixty or seventy feet. They are very devoted 

 to their young and apparently very civil to their neighbors of 

 different species, if unannoyed by them, but woe to the in- 

 truder. 



The charge of eating the eggs and young of other birds in 

 this locality would be a vile slander, and I ask for general and 

 specific testimony to the local facts before I will consent to 

 have so noble a bird thus maligned. As to the indictments of 

 the corn growing agriculturists against him for digging it uj), 

 I venture to say that they never grew up to manhood without 

 a few melon patches having suffered at their several hands, and 

 if luscious, ripe melons are an irresistible temptation to one 

 who has been brought up with the Westminster catechism in 



*lu the case of a great many species of migrating birds, there can be no doubt of 

 their annual return to the same general, and not infrequently the same special locali- 

 ties, from year to year during the life-time of the individual, affording thus an occa- 

 sional opportunity to observe the variations of the plumage associated with age. To 

 do this reliably, a given Individual must have some accidental, unusual mark that is 

 persistent, so as to leave no possible doubt, as in the case of the Baltimore Oriole, des- 

 cribed with the species elsewhere in the Notes. Another has been recently related 

 to me of the present species, by the Hon John DeLaittre, who resides on Nicollet Is- 

 land, in the heart of the city, surrounded with the most beautiful foi'est trees. To- 

 gether with many other species, the Crow Blackbirds breed on that arboreal island, 

 one nest of which was several years ago built in a hole in a tree very near his house, 

 and so placed that it was within ten feet of a chamber window, from which frequent 

 observations were quite unavoidable. Amongst the full grown brood, one male lost a 

 leg by some means, most probably a sling-shot of some marauding boy. It seemed 

 otherwise well, bat was too well marked to escape constant recognition. 



It disappeared late in the autumn with the rest of a large flock, and upon the return 

 of the spring, reappeared with its species, and indue time built a nest in consort with 

 its newly chosen companion near the dwelling, reared another brood, and is confi- 

 dently expected to return again next year provided no unseen foe has destroyed the 

 remaining leg, wings or body. 



Here is a hint of the possibility of following up the life history of individuals, and 

 settling some open questions as to the variations of intensity of coloration within a 

 uniform term of years. I am persuaded that this species does not reach its highest 

 plumage until the fifth year; or until about the end of the first one-fourth of the nat- 

 ural life of the individual. 



