384 HISTORY OF THE 



the winter of 1872, where I found them quite common, but they 

 did not breed in that vicinity to any great extent. After riding 

 many miles, and patiently searching, I succeeded in finding two 

 of their nests with eggs, one on May 6, the other on June 5, 

 1872. Both of tliese nests were placed in the tops of oak trees, 

 from fifteen to twenty feet from the ground, in the foot hills of 

 the Santa Catarina and Rincon Mountains, respectively. 



"Lieutenant Benson was more fortunate in finding the nests 

 of this species, taking over fifty sets of their eggs between May 

 8th and June 18th of this present year. He states in one of 

 his letters to me that the White-necked Raven, in the vicinity 

 of Fort Huachuca, usually builds in mesquit bushes, from seven 

 to fifteen feet from the ground, placing the nests in the top. 

 Occasionally a pair will build on top of a yucca plant. The 

 nests are mostly found on the more open plains, not far from 

 the edge of the thicker chaparral, and usually within a mile of 

 this more bushy tract. The nests are constructed of sticks of 

 various sizes; the cavity is rather deep, and this is lined with 

 hair of cattle and rabbits, and frequently with pieces of the hide 

 of these animals. 



"They are extremely filthy, and smell horribly. Old nests 

 are repaired from year to year, some of them being, as Lieuten- 

 ant Benson expresses it, 'seven or eight stories,' showing use 

 for many years. The series of eggs of this Raven is one of the 

 finest and most complete in the National Museum collection, 

 containing nearly three hundred specimens, almost all obtained 

 from Lieutenant Benson. Their ground color ranges from a 

 light green to a pale grayish green, and this is more or less cov- 

 ered with numerous streaks, blotches and spots of sepia brown 

 and French gray, as well as in some instances of dark moss 

 green and deep grayish olive markings. One peculiar and con- 

 stant feature of these eggs is their resemblance in the pattern of 

 the less pronounced markings (the lighter colored ones) to those 

 found in the eggs of the genus Myiarchus, in this: that these 

 markings run lengthways of the egg^ or from pole to pole, a 

 feature not found by me in the eggs of the common Crow, 

 Corvus americanus Aud., and only very rarely in those of the 



