100 LOUISIANA TANAGER. ■ 



much neatness as the state of the skins would permit. Of three of 

 these, which were put into my hands for examination, the most perfect . 

 was selected for the drawing. Its size and markings were as follow. 

 Length six inches and a half; back, tail, and wings black ; the greater 

 wing-coverts tipped with yellow, the next superior row wholly yellow ; 

 neck, rump, tail-coverts and whole lower parts greenish yellow ; fore- 

 part of the head to and beyond the eyes, light scarlet ; bill yellowish 

 horn color ; edges of the upper mandible ragged, as in the rest of its 

 tribe ; legs light blue ; tail slightly forked, and edged with dull whitish : 

 the whole figure about the size, and much resembling in shape, the 

 Scarlet Tanager (Plate XI, fig. 3.) ; but evidently a different species, 

 from the black back, and yellow coverts. Some of the feathers on the 

 upper part of the back were also skirted with yellow. A skin of what 

 I suppose to be the female, or a young bird, differed in having the winga 

 and back brownish ; and in being rather less. 



The family, or genus, to which this bird belongs, is particularly sub- 

 ject to changes of color, both progressively, during the first and second 

 seasons ; and also periodically, afterwards. Some of those that inhabit 

 Pennsylvania change from an olive green to a greenish yellow ; and, 

 lastly, to a brilliant scarlet ; and I confess when the preserved specimen 

 of the present species was first shown me, I suspected it to have been 

 passing through a similar change at the time it was taken. But having 

 examined two more skins of the same species, and finding them all 

 marked very nearly alike, which is seldom the case with those birds tliat 

 change while moulting, I began to think tliat this might be its most 

 permanent, or at least its summer or winter dress. 



The little information I have been able to procure of the species 

 generally, or at what particular season these were shot, prevents me 

 from being able to determine this matter to my wish. 



I can only learn, that they inhabit the extensive plains or prairies of 

 the Missouri, between the Osage and Mandan nations ; building their 

 nests in low bushes, and often among the grass. With us the Tanagers 

 usually build on the branches of a hickory or white oak sapling. These 

 birds delight in various kinds of berries with which those rich prairies 

 are said to abound. 



