THE PERCHING Birps. 89 
be thankful that we are blessed with so many spar- 
rows of so many kinds. 
Ridgway’s Manual calls for ninety-two species, 
and, of course, of varieties and geographical races 
there is a goodly number. Of these, a very large 
proportion are Eastern species, and their Western 
representatives do not materially vary in the mat- 
ter of habits. Of course difference of environment 
causes some variation in habits, and different areas 
that are much alike to our eyes have some subtle 
peculiarities that affect the voices of the birds. More 
than one bird that is common to New England and 
the Middle States does not sing in the same way in 
the two localities. Again, I have heard song-spar- 
rows, thrushes, and the rose-breasted grosbeak sing- 
ing in almost a monotonous way at the sea-shore, 
when their songs were clear and far-reaching not 
fifty miles away, but at a considerable elevation, and 
this difference of atmosphere may be an all-impor- 
tant matter. 
The leader of the sparrow host is the Evening 
Grosbeak, which has its home in the far northwest, 
where in comparative solitude the males warble in a 
manner suggestive of the beginning of a robin’s 
song, which is saying but little in way of praise, the 
entire song of the robin not being remarkable asa 
whole, and the beginning really the poorer end of it. 
Occasionally this far-off bird wanders eastward, as 
in the winter of 1889-90, when numbers entered the 
New England States, and presumably were all killed 
to prevent the possibility of their return or of their 
remaining as residents. They were in Pennsylvania, 
g* 
