288 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 



killed an Indigo-bird, and two or three others, that were occasion- 

 ally placed with them, driving them into a corner of the cage, 

 standing on them, and tearing out their feathers, striking them on 

 the head, munching their wings, &c., till I was obliged to interfere ; 

 and, even if called to, the aggressor would only turn up a malicious 

 eye to me for a moment, and renew his outrage as before. They are 

 a hardy, vigorous bird. In the month of October, about the time 

 of their first arrival, I shot a male, rich in jDlumage, and plump in 

 flesh, but which wanted one leg, that had been taken off a little 

 above the knee : the wound had healed so completely, and was 

 covered with so thick a skin, that it seemed as though it had been 

 so for years. Whether this mutilation was occasioned by a shot, or 

 in party quarrels of its own, I could not determine : but our invalid 

 seemed to have used his stump either in hopping or resting ; for it 

 had all the appearance of having been brought in frequent contact 

 with bodies harder than itself." 



CHRYSOMITRIS, Boie. 



Chrysomitris, Boie, Lsis (1828), 322. (Type Fringilla spimis, Linnseus.) 

 Bill rather acutely conic, the tip not veiy sharp; the culmen slightly convex at 

 the tip; the commissure gently curved; nostrils concealed; obsolete ridges on the 

 upper mandible; tarsi shorter than the middle toe; outer toe rather the longer, 

 reaching to the base of the middle one; claw of hind toe shorter than the digital 

 portion; wings and tail as in Aeffiothvs. 



The colors are generally j'ellow, with black on the crown, throat, back, wings, 

 and tail, varied sometimes with white. 



CHRYSOMITRIS TRISTIS. — Bonaparte. 

 The Yellow-bird; Thistle-bird. 



Frinfjilla tristis, Linnaeus. Syst. Nat., I. (1766) 320. Wils. Am. Orn., I. (1808) 20. 

 Aud. Orn. Biog., I. (1831) 172; V. 510. 



Desckiption. 



Bright gamboge-yellow; crown, wings, and tail, black; lesser wing coverts, 

 band across the end of greater ones, ends of secondaries and tertiaries, inner mar- 

 gins of tail feathers, upper and under tail coverts, and tibia, white. Female re- 

 placing the yellow of the male by a greenish-olive color. 



Length, five and twenty-five one-hundredths inches; wing, three inches. 



This "well-known bird is a very common summer inhab- 

 itant of all New England, and in the southern districts 



