AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 37 



and in her haste to reach the nest flew against the thorn, which pene- 

 trated the loose skin of her throat, and when she dropped her füll 

 weight upon it, she co.ild not free herseif. There was no evidence of 

 a struggle about the bird or her nest, and so it seeras likely that the 

 bird's suf^erings were brief. Perhaps the thorn piereed the windpipe 

 sufficiently to cause speedy death by strangling. 



Photo by W. Leon Dawson. 

 ROBIN TRAGEDY. 



This is the first bird I have ever seen caught in this way on a thorn. 

 Many birds, such as the thrashers, robins, cardinals and shrikes, often 

 build their nests in the most wicked looking thorn-bushes and hedges, 

 into which they frequently plunge with seeming recklessness, and I 

 have often wondered how they avoid impaling themselves; but it is a 

 real comfort to know that fatalities of the kind described are of rare 

 occurrence. The only one bearing a close resemblance to the robin 

 tragedy that has come under my eye was that of a song sparrow which 



