parts of the woods near water courses, utters its usual mournful note, and roosts 

 in these places. It travels mostly by day. 



Few Hawks attack the Mocking Birds, as on their approach, however sudden 

 it may be, they are always ready not only to defend themselves vigorously and 

 with undaunted courage, but to meet the aggressor halfway, and force him to 

 abandon his intention. The only Hawk that occasionally surprises it is the Coop- 

 ers' Hawk, which flies low with great swiftness, and carries the bird off without 

 any apparent stoppage. Should it happen that the ruffian misses his prey, the 

 Mocking Bird in turn becomes the assailant, and pursues the Hawk with great 

 courage, calling in the meantime all the birds of its species to its assistance ; and 

 although it cannot overtake the marauder, the alarm created by their cries, which 

 are repeated in succession by all the birds in the vicinity, like the watchwords 

 of sentinels on duty, prevents him from succeeding in his attwnpts. 



The musical powers of this bird have often been mentioned by European 

 naturalists, and persons who find pleasure in listening to the song of different 

 birds while in confinement or at large. Some of these persons have described 

 the notes of the Nightingale as occasionally fully equal to those of our bird, but 

 to compare her essays to the finished talent of the Mocking Bird is, in my opinion, 

 absurd. 



The Brown dreeper {CertMa famUiaris americana) 



By I. N. Mitchell 



Length: 5^ inches. 



Range: Eastern North America. 



Food : Small insects, wasps, ants, bugs, cocoons of tineid moths. 



Nest behind the loosened bark of trees and stumps, built of strips of bark, 

 feathers, moss ; eggs, five to eight. 



Although the brown creeper winters sparingly in the north, to the great 

 majority of our people it is known only as a spring and fall migrant. On the 

 upward journey it passes through many states and beyond to glean its summer's 

 living from the tree-trunks of the great forests of Canada. 



During the last week of March and the first week of April even the casual 

 observer is apt to notice a little gray, or brownish bird creeping up the trunks 

 of the trees. Stopping to watch the little fellow it appears that he is very 

 methodical, very busy, and very persistent. It seems to be not only business 

 that occupies him, but a very serious business. There is no stopping to exult 

 for a moment in song, no idling away of time in preening of feathers, none of 

 these little by-plays of the early mating season, nothing but that serious, per- 

 sistent gliding from one tree to another, up it and on to the foot of the next, 

 that suggests one of the old-time copy-book exercises, "downglide-up, down- 

 glide-up." 



But the pen exercise lasted only for a page, while the creeper's exercise 

 begins early in the morning, lasts till dusk and begins again early the next morn- 



iio 



