SCARLET TANAGER. 
prilliant aniline dyes which fairly makes the eyes swim} 
The whole plumage of the bird, except wings and tail, is 
an intense red-scarlet; not a vermilion color, for that 
Jacks life, but a vivid hue such as one can only produce 
by superimposing Geranium Lake upon Scarlet Ver- 
milion. The wings and tail are glossy black; the under 
wing-coverts white. Female light olive green above, 
yellow-green beneath; wings and tail umber brown 
margined with dull olive green. Young males like the 
female but with black wings and tail. By the first of 
September the adult male moults his scarlet feathers, 
and these 4re replaced for winter wear by others of a 
bright olive green hue.* The nest is a loose-woven cup- 
like structure of coarse grass, plant stalks, and vine 
tendrils lightly but skilfully put together; it is usually 
located near the end of a horizontal limb, about twenty 
feet (often much less) above the ground. Egg pale 
greenish blue, strongly marked with madder brown. 
This bird is distributed from southern Illinois and Vir- 
ginia northward to New Brunswick and Manitoba. 
The song of the Scarlet Tanager like that of the Rose- 
breasted Grosbeak has been frequently compared to the 
Robin. H. L. Nelson and E. A. Samuels, both writers 
about our northeastern birds, express the opinion that 
the songs are similar. Florence A. Merriam also says 
the song suggests that of the Robin, and J. B. Grant 
thinks ‘‘ there is indeed a likeness between the two, the 
Robin’s song excelling, however, in heartiness if not in 
variety.” Some years ago when I first made the ac- 
quaintance of the bird, I was deceived into thinking the 
song was that of the Robin; but in a minute of time I 
discovered a peculiar burred character to the voice and 
shortly afterward traced it to its proper source. To be 
sure, there is a certain wild-wood likeness between all 
bird songs, and between those of the Rose-breasted 
*W. EH. D. Scott says, in Bird Studies: ‘“‘The males... vary 
very much in the shade and intensity of both the red of the body 
and black of the wings and tail. They also present curious ex- 
amples of color variation. .. One of the most frequent of these 
divergences is in the direction of one or two more or less clearly 
defined scarlet or bright yellow wing-bars. These occur most 
often in very intensely colored birds.” 
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