86 THE PINE SISKIN. 
the “new physicists” are telling us about. When a bird is sighted alone, 
one sees that it is the graceful, undulatory, or “looping,” flight of cousin 
Goldfinch which the social Siskin indulges so recklessly. 
Many of the notes, too, remind us of the Goldfinch. ‘There are first 
those little chattering notes indulged a-wing and a-perch, when the birds are 
not too busy feeding. The koodayi of inquiry or greeting is the same. But 
there is another note quite distinctive. It is a labored, but singularly penetrat- 
ing production with a peculiar vowel sound (like a German umlauted u), 
slim or gzeem. So much effort does the utterance of this note cost the bird, 
Photo by W. Leon Dawson. 
THE DRAPERIES OF PARADISE. 
RAINIER AS SEEN BY THE SISKIN. 
that it always occasions a display of the hidden sulphur markings of wings 
and tail. 
When fired by passion the Siskin is capable, also, of extended song. 
This daytime serenade is vivacious, but not loud except in occasional pas- 
sages,—a sort of chattering, ecstatic warble of diverse elements. The bird 
has, besides its own peculiar notes, many finch-like phrases and interpolations, 
reminding one now of the Goldfinch, and now of the California Purple Finch. 
The most striking phrase produced in this connection is a triple shriek of the 
Evening Grosbeak, subdued of course, but very effective. 
Tho perhaps not numerically equal to the Western Golden-crowned 
Kinglet, nor to the Western Winter Wren, there is not another bird in Wash- 
ington which enjoys a more nearly uniform distribution than the Pine 
