52 Bulletin No. 2[. 



teresting facts learned was that the swallows and most of the Icteridae 

 had already begun preparations for the southward migrations. Many of 

 the birds were evidently still burdened with household affairs, but many 

 of them were in the molt. 



To you who find a rail-road journey irksome I beg to recommend a 

 note-book tonic. It will do as well at one time of year as at another, 

 and whether the journey be over new or familiar ground. It will be no 

 harder on the eyes than reading, and far less confining. 



Lynds Jones, Obcrlin, Ohio. 



A PUZZLED GOLDFINCH. 



Our woodshed is lighted by a single window of six small panes, or 

 rather, five panes and a hole where one ought to be. On the outside a 

 grape-vine is trained against the wall, and has grown up so as partially to 

 shade the window. An ambitious runner has found its way through the 

 open space and is groping wildly about in the inner gloom. This runner 

 forms the mainstay of a complicated system of cobwebs which cover the 

 window inside. 



Yesterday, my wife, as she was passing through the shed, heard a 

 peculiar tapping on the window, and called me to see a female Goldfinch 

 seeking admission by one of the lower panes. We were at a loss to 

 know at first what she was after, but came to the conclusion that she was 

 hunting cobwebs. The particular pane she was at had a tempting net- 

 work of them on the inside. The bird pecked and fluttered and worried 

 for a long time until she gave every evidence of being mentally de- 

 pressed. It was her first experience with bottled cobwebs, and it put 

 her out considerably. She tried different panes so far as she could find 

 support for her feet. Several leaves brushed the glass, but they would 

 not hold the bird's weight, so she hit upon the scheme of biting the outer 

 ribs in two and doubling the leaf over on itself. Thus folded the leaf 

 would support her and she could peck away on the windows to her 

 heart's content. All this time she manifested no interest in the broken 

 pane where she might have secured easy access to a perfect mine of 

 cobwebs. So enamored was she of her self imposed task, that she paid 

 little attention to me as I approached from the inside. I even proffered 

 her a grass head through the opening, and she nibbled at it sulkily with- 

 out show of fear. 



To-day she has returned to the attack. The outside webs have all 

 been gathered, and I doubt not that she is somewhere lining a nest with 



