44 NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 



attention attracted by the new note of a bird unfamiliar to him. It was 

 found, after some observation, to proceed from this species He describes 

 it as rising with a tremulous motion of its wings some twenty feet or more, 

 and then descending again, in the same manner, to within a few yards of 

 the spot whence it started, and as accompanying its entire flight with a 

 lengthened and pleasing song. The country in that neighborhood is very 

 barren, covered with low stunted bushes, in which the bird takes refuge on 

 being .alarmed, gliding rapidly through the grass and shrubbery, and very 

 adroitly and etlectually e\-ading its pursuer. He observed them during four 

 or five days of the journey of his party, and after that saw no more of them. 

 They seemed, at the time, to be migrating, though their continued and oft- 

 repeated song also showed tliat they were not far from readiness for the 

 duties of incubation. 



The Peuccca cassini is said, by Mr. Sumichrast, to be a resident species in 

 the valley of Orizaba, in the State of Vera Cruz, Mexico, and to be gen- 

 erally-distributed throughout the temperate region of that district. It is 

 very i^robable, however, that he has in view the Mexican race of P. cestivcdis 

 (var. bofferii), and not the present species. 



Mr. J. A. Allen, who considers this bird only a western form of P. cestiva- 

 lis, mentions (Am. Xaturalist, May, 1872) finding it quite frequently near 

 the streams in Western Kansas, where its sweetly modulated song greets 

 the ear with the first break of dawn, and is again heard at night till the 

 last trace of twilight has disappeared, ilr. Allien also states, in a letter, 

 that this bird was " tolerably common along the streams near Fort Hays, but 

 very retiring, singing mostly after nightfall and before sunrise, during the 

 morning twilight. When singing, it had the habit of rising into the air. I 

 shot three one morning thus singing, when it was so dark I could not find 

 the birds. The one I obtained does not differ appreciably from specimens 

 from Mr. Cassin's collection, labelled by him Peuccca cassini, collected in 

 Texas." 



Mr. Eidgwaj' regards tJiis record of the manners of this bird, while sing- 

 ing, as indicating a specific difference from P. astivalis. The latter, in 

 Southern Illinois, has never been heard by him to sing at night, or in the 

 morning, nor even on the wing ; liut in broad midday, in the hottest days of 

 June, July, and August, he often heard them singing vigorously and sweetly, 

 as they perched upon a fence or a dead tree in a field, exactly after the man- 

 ner of our comuKui Spizelht pusilla. 



Among Dr. Heermann's notes, quoted hj ilr. Dresser, is one containing 

 the statement that he found this species not rare on the prairies near the 

 Medina River, in Texas, where it breeds. ]\Ir. Dresser also states that when 

 at Howard's lianche, early in Alay, he found this bird by no means uncom- 

 mon. He confirms Dr. Heermann's account, that it is easily distinguished as 

 it rises in the air, from a bush, with a peculiar fluttering motion of the wings, 

 at the same time singing, and then suddenly dropping into the bushes again. 



