BROWN THRASHER. bs at 
breasts creamy or “buffy white,” spotted with 
brown, while their sides were heavily streaked. 
The thrashers are about the length and build of 
the cuckoos, and before I had seen them near by 
I confused the two. But you can distinguish be- 
tween them even at a distance, for the breast of 
the cuckoos is pure white, while that of the thrash 
ers is heavily spotted. When you are near enough 
to discern shades, you see that the rich reddish- 
brown back of the thrasher is in strong contrast 
to the dull grayish-brown of the cuckoo. While 
the cuckoo is practically songless, the song of the 
thrasher is excelled by few of our birds, combin- 
ing the flexibility of the catbird with the sweetness 
of the thrush. 
The thrasher is said to show much intelligence 
in choosing the position for its nest. In dry sandy 
regions it seems to prefer the ground, but if the 
soil is damp or clayey it builds in bushes; and 
along river banks in the west, where sudden 
freshets would swamp a low nest, with notable 
foresight it secures its nest in trees, sometimes as 
high as fifteen or twenty feet from the ground. 
During migration, last fall, I was looking for 
warblers in the raspberry patch one morning be- 
fore breakfast. When near the edge of the woods 
I heard the suppressed shreea a gray squirrel 
makes when scolding between its teeth. It was 
so near that I looked down hoping to catch sight 
of the impudent bright eyes, but not a squirrel 
