On the Habits o/Micropus melanoleucus. 151 



XIV. — Observations upon the Habits of Micropus melauo- 

 leucus, with Critical Notes on its Plumage and External 

 Characters. By R. W. Shukeldt, C.M.Z.S., Capt., Med. 

 Corps, U.S. Army. 



(Plate V.) 



My first acquaintance with this very interesting Swift was 

 made during the spring of 1878, while I was on my way from 

 the little frontier town of Cheyenne, Wyoming Territory, 

 to the military station of Fort Laramie, situated some 80 

 miles to the northward of it. On the Chngwater Creek, 

 about halfway between these two points, we pass some very 

 high and imposing chalk cliffs w^hich constitute the more 

 striking and prominent features of the landscape, as the 

 country about them is low and unbroken, being quite prairie- 

 like in its character. 



The head of one of these large chalk-bluffs, as it stood out 

 against the clear blue sky and far above me, actually looked, 

 with the cloud of white-throated Swifts swarming about 

 it, like some great beehive from which the inhabitants had 

 been suddenly aroused. These birds were far above the 

 range of my fowling-piece, though one, now and then, 

 dipped clown with the most inconceivable velocity and in a 

 graceful curve over my head, as if to obtain a better view 

 of me. A snap-shot brought down one of these more accom- 

 modating individuals, whose curiosity cost his life, and gave 

 me not only a beautiful specimen, but the opportunity to 

 examine in the flesh, for the first time, one of the then rarest 

 birds in our American collections. 



During the past eight years I have only caught glimpses 

 of single specimens of this bird here and there, and some- 

 times in the most unexpected places. Once, far out on the 

 open prairie, in the north-western part of the United States, 

 a magnificent adult Swift of this species shot by me with 

 the velocity of a meteor, his white flank- patches contrasting 

 conspicuously with his black-brown body and wings. It was 

 not, however, until I came to Fort Wingate that the oppor- 

 tunity was really afforded me to more intimately study and 



