THRUSH COUSINS 



Catbird in appearance and in some of its traits. I have 

 watched and heard it a good deal in the South, but it 

 also comes up sparingly into the Middle States, and I 

 have met it as far north as Boston. 



And now for the most wren-like of all the Troglody- 

 tidce, for there is nothing so like wrens as the wrens 

 themselves. They all look a good deal alike, little 

 brown fellows, artful dodgers indeed, that run into 

 about every imaginable crevice or cranny, hunting out 

 insects and their eggs or larvae, surely a useful tribe. 

 Best known of them all, and most beloved, is the House 

 Wren. How glad we are in May to hear again the 

 merry, bubbling song in the garden and around the 

 house, and in due time to see the little people hunting 

 for a building-site. Almost any sort of a hole will do, 

 in a building, in a tree, a bird-box, an old tin can, or 

 any crevice. As soon as they have chosen the place, 

 they go right to work to fill it up with twigs, in the 

 midst of which they make a soft nest of grass and 

 feathers and the like. 



Some of the sites which they select are perfectly 

 ridiculous. I have known them to build in the pocket 

 of a coat hung up in a shed, and in a hat or pot laid 

 on a shelf. The funniest and most audacious thing I 

 ever saw a bird do I am almost afraid to tell, lest I 

 should injure my reputation for truthfulness. But, 

 having a reliable witness, I will venture to tell it. I 

 was off on an expedition in the West with Dr. L. B. 

 Bishop, of New Haven, Conn., a well-known ornithol- 



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