A Book on Birds 



meal of moths and other insects from the 

 vantage of a telegraph wire. These are 

 the little fighters that may be seen circling 

 around a clumsy Crow on the wing and 

 harrying it to complete exhaustion. And 

 yet, in a fair contest, they are arrant 

 cowards notwithstanding. 



You can identify them by their sharp, 

 quick cry in flight; the nervous, jerky 

 motion of their wings; the conspicuous 

 border of white, straight across the end of 

 the tail feathers; and the low tuft of 

 feathers, with its scarlet spot, adorning 

 the head. 



Somewhere in the neighborhood also is 

 their near relative — the Crested Flycatcher, 

 top-knotted far more than they, and keep- 

 ing an eye on his nest in a tree-hole — with 

 its odd, chocolate-streaked eggs. 



And then, where the stream crosses the 

 by-road, a Spotted Sandpiper sounds his 

 high-keyed cry and scurries along above 

 the water. The way in which his short, 

 flat tail bobs up and down unceasingly, 

 every time he alights upon a stone, on the 



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