130 Sketches of Some Common Birds. 



the cowbird, while a second Qg^ of the latter species was 

 lying on the ground about a foot from the nest. It would 

 be interesting to know whether the Qgg outside of the nest 

 had been dropped there by the impatient cowbird, or had 

 been ejected from the nest by the unwilling foster parent. 

 One summer late in June, while rambling in a bushy 

 wooded pasture, I startled a female towhee from the black- 

 berry shoots among which I was walking. Almost from 

 under my feet she painfully fluttered, and without rising 

 from the ground, half hopping and half flying, she moved 

 with outspread, beating wings over the dead leaves and 

 hopped among the neighboring bushes. At first thought 

 I imagined I had stepped on her and injured her; but as 

 she hopped under and out of the fallen branches and into 

 the top of a brushpile, uttering her anxious *' chwink," I 

 realized that I had witnessed a fine exhibition of maternal 

 instinct, and that the bird was not injured in 'the least. 

 Examining her more closely as she sat exposed to my 

 view, I observed that she had not the glossy black colors 

 of the male, but had a more feminine dress of reddish- 

 brown, though in her nervous actions as she hopped about, 

 she exposed the white corners of her dark brown tail 

 when she spread it in fan-like movement. From the 

 uneasiness she discovered, I believed a nest to be near. I 

 searched closely in the group of bushes, but failed to find 

 the nest until I approached the spot in the manner 1 had 

 formerly reached it, when there at my feet I found the 

 nest open and exposed to the afternoon sun. It was set 

 in a hollow among the dead oak leaves at the base of a 

 blackberry shoot, and was almost flush with the surface, 

 both the materials and the eggs closely resembling their 

 surroundings. The nest itself was formed of common 

 dried grass, with a lining of finer dried grass and a few 

 horsehairs. It is usually well rounded, though rather 

 loosely woven. It is about three inches in diameter and 

 two inches deep. The eggs vary from three to five, and 

 the}^ are grayish or pinkish white, with numerous specks 

 of pink and reddish brown. They average .95 by .72 of 

 an inch. While the female is showing her anxiety and 

 appealing to the intruder with her plaintive "chwink" 

 to leave her undisturbed in her family affairs, the male 



