lO ABSTRACT OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE 



forest. Nor is it pure imagination to declare that many notes of the 

 closely allied group of thrashers, especially j;ome of those found in 

 Southern California, bespeak their kinship to the wrens. 



Among the flycatchers, when we consider their poor development as 

 singers, there seems to be an unusual dissimilarity of language. Take 

 for instance the notes of the Wood-pewec, King-bird and Crested Fly- 

 catcher, belonging to three different genera. When at rest the notes 

 of the first two have little in common, but in their aerial or flight-song 

 there is a remarkable similarity not only in the circling, twisting, hover- 

 ing manner of flight, but in the method of delivering the song, viz., a 

 succession of single-syllabled notes terminating in a crescendo somer- 

 sault, during which a climax double or compound note is uttered, the 

 same performance being repeated several times before descending to 

 the chosen perching place. The Crested Flycatcher does not indulge 

 in a flight-song, but its warning notes as it stands sentinel over its nest 

 are of the same character as those of all other American flycatchers. 

 Its harsh exclamatory cry or single call, by which it is best known, 

 seems to have little in common with the corresponding utterances 

 of the king-bird or pewee, but it frequently relaxes into a double- 

 syllabled modification of this which resembles in notation that uttered 

 by both king-bird and pewee under similar conditions. There is also 

 a tremulous twitter of apparent satisfaction uttered by all three species 

 when they return to the perch after a successful foray. In the case 

 of the Great Crest, however, it is more like a harsh laugh. In all three 

 of these tyrant flycatchers the notes uttered while they are pursuing an 

 enemy are unmistakably alike in their tyrannine character. 



.Another marked instance of family resemblance in song is seen in 

 the ranagridae. The scarlet, summer, hepatic, Louisiana and Cooper's 

 tanagers with which I have made acquaintance have songs and call 

 notes so closely resembling each other that it requires an exceedmgly 

 expert ear to distinguish some of them. 



Among families which seem to contain exceptions to the rule of 

 family song resemblance mention may be made of the Vireos, one 

 aberrant member of which seems to delight in strange surprises of 

 vocal mockery and jest, viz the White-eye. It has a distinct whistle, 

 which, however, has its counterpart in bars of tht song of the red-eye, 

 solitary and yellow throated species. It is desirable that some one 

 with an ear for music and a correspondingly wide knowledge of birds 

 in their homes both in this and in foreign lands may follow up this 

 subject. It is not impossible that our knowledge of the genealogy of 

 families of birds far removed by the natural barriers of climate and 



