60 THE AMERICAN DIPPER. 
I have thus referred to the English dipper to 
introduce its very near relation, inhabiting the 
far North-west. It, too, eschews all sociable com- 
munion, disdaining the slightest approach to a 
gregarious life except when mated, choosing in- 
variably wild mountain-streams, where, amidst 
the roar of cascades, whirling eddies, and swift 
torrents, it passes its lonely life. 
The American dipper (Hydrobata Mexicana) 
ranges from the coast to the summit of the Rocky 
Mountains. I have killed it at an altitude of 
seven thousand feet above the sea-level. In size 
it very nearly resembles the European bird, but 
differs greatly in colour; being of a uniform 
plumbeous grey, the only markings a minute 
spot above the anterior corner of the eye. 
I once found the nest of the American dipper 
built amongst the roots ofa large cedar-tree that 
had floated down the stream and got jammed 
against the milldam of the Hudson’s Bay Com- 
pany’s old grist-mill, at Fort Colville, on a tribu- 
tary to the Upper Columbia river. The water, 
rushing over a jutting ledge of rocks, formed a 
small cascade, that fell like a veil of water before 
the dipper’s nest; and it was most curious to see 
the birds dash through the waterfall, rather than 
go in at the sides, and in that way get behind it. 
