CARPODACUS FRONTALIS. 459 



abundant of llie birds found at Sacramento, where it frequented tlie sliade- 

 trees of the streets or the door-yards and gardens in the city in preference to 

 groves in the suburbs or country. In its abundance and semi-domestic hab- 

 its it thus reminds one somewhat of the European House Sparrow {Pi/iffita 

 (lomestica), but, unlike tluit Ijinl, has endeared itself to its protectors by 

 the possession of a sweet song and brilliant plumage. It is greatly ])riz('d 

 as a cage-bird, and justly, too, for while its plumage is equally i)retty, its 

 notes excel those of the Oannry in sweetness, while nt the same time they 

 are fully equal in vi\afit}' and power. All the iK)te.s are decidedly Canarj-- 

 like, the usual utterance being a soft, musical twcct. The song itself differs 

 inim that of the Canary chiefly in being more tender, less piercing, and 

 interspersed \\ illi more varied warblings. The males were observed to be 

 shyer than the females, their wariness being perhaps explained liy the fact 

 that several were noticed which had their tails clipped, showing that they 

 had once been in captivity. When their nests were disturbed, however, 

 the males exhibited as much concern as the females, and kept up a livelv 

 chinlcing from an adjoining tree. 



Few birds are more variable as to the choice of a location for their 

 nests than the present species, since it adapts itself readily to any sort of a 

 place where safety is assured. At Sacramento, they usually built among the 

 small oak trees, generally near the extremity of a horizontal branch, but 

 one nest was placed inside the pendulous, basket-like structure of a "Hang- 

 ing-bird" {Icterus luUoclci); in the narrow gorge of the Truckee River, 

 where that stream breaks through the Virginia Mountains, one was found 

 inside the abandoned nest of a Cliff Swallow; along the eastern shore of 

 P}ramid Lake numerous nests were found among the rocks, placed on 

 shelves in the interior of caves, along with those of the Barn Swallow and 

 Say's Pewee, or in crevices on the outside of the tufa-domes, while in the 

 neighboring valley of the Truckee, where there was an abundance of cotton- 

 wood timber, their nests were nearly all built in the low grease-wood bushes. 

 On Antelope Island, in the Great Salt Lake, thoy preferred the sage-brush, 

 like the Black-throated and Brewer's Sjjarrows; in Cit}' Creek Cafion, near 

 Salt Lake City, one was found in a mountain-mahogany tree, while iu 

 Parley's Park another was in a cotton- wood tree along a stream. At all the 



