40 



ORNITHOLOGIST 



[Vol. 17-No. 3 



A nest at Port Kells, from wliicb I took a 

 set of four fresh eggs, now in my collection, 

 was placed in a small balsam, about seven 

 feet from the ground, and composed of stalks of 

 weeds and some bark fibres, plastered on the 

 inside with mud, and lined with fine, dry 

 grass. These are of the same form, and of a 

 similar greenish blue color as those of the 

 eastern Robin, but, as previously noted, are a 

 little larger. This was on the I4th of May; at 

 the same period I observed in that vicinity 

 young Robins able to fiy, which must have 

 been incubated in the latter part of March. 



At Gieen Lake, some miles eastward of 

 Seattle, the southern terminus of my western 

 rambles, I observed anotlier nest of this 

 species composed outwardly almost wholly of 

 moss. This was placed on a forked branch of 

 a small birch tree, leaning over a small stream 

 of water, near the border of the lake into 

 which the stream emptied, the nest being 

 about fifteen feet over the water, and then 

 contained young. With the exception of a 

 number of Spotted Sandpipers on tiie sands of 

 the lake shore, I saw but few other birds here, 

 though I remained some hours in the vicinity. 

 Tills was on the 18th of May. 



TUK VAHIEl) THRUSH. 



This is one of the most beautifully plumaged 

 and pleasing songsters whose presence and 

 notes affect the wild woods in the lower 

 Frazer valley, in British Columbia. In size it 

 is about the same as the Hermit Thrush, and 

 its song notes closely resemble those of tlie 

 iintKlelinus, but to me these did not appear to 

 be so loud or prolonged, yet, as the season 

 was still early, and before the nesting period 

 had begun when I had the pleasure of listen- 

 ing to its lays, it may be that, as the Varied 

 Thrush season advances, it pitches its notes in 

 a higher key, and devotes more time and 

 energy to the emission of its charming music, 

 and, while the ear is delighted with its song, 

 the eye of the student of nature who rambles 

 in these primeval wilds, which it makes its 

 haunts and home, is no less pleased with its 

 varied plumage of dark brown and golden 

 yellow. And when to these natural advan- 

 tages of song are added its graceful move- 

 ments among the deep green foliage and 

 snowy blossoms, which in the early summer 

 intermingle in the Columbian forest, it may 

 be imagined that this species is among tiie 

 most noteworthy of all the avifauna families 

 west of the Rocky Mountains. 



The tourist, whatever be his object, wlio 

 suddenly finds himself in the woods bordering 



the streams or wave washed shores of the 

 Pacific Coast of our western province, is at 

 once astonished at the diflercnt appearance of 

 his surroundings to what he had previously 

 observed nearer the Atlantic, sea-board. The 

 woods, the rocks, the mountains, luive all a 

 different aspect, even the air has a different 

 smell, and for a time produc<'s different effects 

 on the physical .system and impressions on 

 the mind, and many of the birds whose forms 

 meet his gaze and music falls upon iiis eai-, 

 iiave differently lined plumages, and notes. 



Favored by a rich soil and temperate cli- 

 mate, giant firs raise their wnving tops to an 

 altitude surpassing those in most otiier lands; 

 monster cedars rival these in tallness and 

 trunk proportions; balsams and other ever- 

 greens, though much smaller, nevertheless 

 standing close together, ca.st a deep shade on 

 the damp earth, from whence spring, while 

 intermingling with these, species of white 

 wood, alders, and large flowering dogwood, 

 which altogether make a forest so dense thiit 

 it can scarcely be penetrated, and few attemjit 

 to do so except on matters of business. It is 

 late in the forenoon before the sun's rays pen- 

 etrate these gloomy woods, and though out in 

 the clearing the heat is at times oppressive, 

 yet in these shades there is always a coolness, 

 though the wind's influence is seldom felt and 

 storms cannot rage, while in most places, as 

 the spring and summer advances, the ground 

 is covered with mosses intermingled with 

 plants and flowers of varied and beautiful 

 hues. Amid such scenes are the haunts and 

 home of the Varied Thrush, and should it 

 appreciate views of scenery, which perhaps it 

 does, it has only to move a short distance 

 from the deepest shade to the lakelet shoie, 

 the liver bank, or the margin of the lippling 

 brook, to view the azure sky, the noonday sun, 

 and the dark outlines of rock-formed moun- 

 tains whose sum.mits aie capi)ed with eternal 

 snows. 



Such feeble outline of some of the localities 

 alfected by the presence of this species may 

 assist in conveying to the mental vision of the 

 reader ideas not otherwise attainable, yet 

 inseparable fioni its life history, and should 

 the eastern reader Avander on a summer morn- 

 ing in some dark wood, and hear in the higher 

 branches the song notes of the Rose-breasted 

 Grosbeak and the Scarlet Tanager, and in 

 unison with these, in the lower woods, the 

 soul-inspiring lays of the AVood Thrush, he 

 may withour. much stretch of the imagination 

 assume that he is passing through a part of a 



