9 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 
familiar way ; nevertheless, it is a sociable, gentle bird, and if un- 
molested will build and rear its young.in the same spot, under the 
eaves of some out-building, or in a deserted Martin’s box or even a 
knothole in a fence post. 
For several years. when the large rustic pavilion was standing in 
the centre of the Horticultural Society’s Gardens the Blue. Birds 
used to build regularly every season among the rafters of the roof, 
and their soft warbling notes could be heard all through the summer 
as, perched on the ridge, they dressed and plumed their feathers 
after returning from the capture of some moth or grasshopper or other 
insect prey. 
Sometimes in the last days of March, though generally not until 
the 3rd, 6th or 7th of April, comes an old friend, familiar to most of 
us from boyhood, the Pee-wee, Fly-Catcher, Sayornis Fusca.  Al1- 
though it has but the one plaintive note, pee-wee, sometimes long- 
drawn out, and then changing into a little tremulous, murmuring 
twitter, as flying down from its perch on the housetop, or the gable 
of some old barn, it snaps up a passing insect, yet few sounds of 
bird voices are pleasanter to the lover of nature, for it is suggestive 
of warmth and sunshine, the waking up of insect life and all the 
gladness and freshness of spring. What should render this Fly- 
Catcher a special favourite with us is the tameness and familiarity 
with which it harbours about our dwellings, and its attachment to 
the same spot wherein to build its nest year after year; it may be 
under the eaves of the barn or stable, or, as if boldly claiming our 
protection, it will attach its fabric of mud and moss, and fine grasses, 
to some convenient ledge under the roof of our verandahs, where its 
proceedings may be watched day by day by all the inmates of the 
house. 
By the 5th or 10th of April the Tree Sparrow, Spizella Monticola, 
and the. Chipping Sparrow, Spizella Domestica, have made their 
appearance. The latter well merits its epithet of Domestica, for it is 
one of the tamest and most sociable of our feathered friends, and 
under the name of “grey bird” is known to almost every child in 
the country. No sweeter song is heard at this season.of the year 
than the warbling of that handsome bird, the Purple Finch, Carpo- 
dacus Purpureus, which, although it may occasionally be seen in a 
very mild winter in company with the Siskin, or Crossbills, yet is 
a. sufficiently rare winter bird to make its advent the more marked 
