268 LAND BIRDS 
tree trunk, and I think some signal note was uttered by 
the latter which told the nestlings that dinner was ready. 
Later on, in another locality, | witnessed the début 
of one of these interesting water-babies. He was a 
comical counterpart of the adults, wink and all, except 
for the touch of white on his feathers and his absurdly 
short tail, rendered more absurd by his continual bob- 
bing dip. This dipping on the part of young and old 
Water Ouzels is a distressingly undecided performance, 
as if the bird could not quite make up his mind whether 
or not to sit down, and stood continually in the valley 
of indecision. This young Ouzel remained all day on a 
ledge at the foot of the wall of rock which held his 
former nursery, and was fed by the male as devotedly 
as though still in the nest. So long as it was light 
enough to see, lhe was there, and at my last glimpse of 
him he stood winking and dipping in the same funny 
way. The other nestlings were still in the oven-like 
ball of green moss wherein they had been hatched, and 
their heads filled the doorway in eager petitioning for 
food. It never came often enough or in sufficient quan- 
tities to satisfy them, and one could only wonder when 
the overworked parents found time to supply their own 
needs. 
702. SAGE THRASHER. — Oroscoptes montanus. 
Famity: The Wrens, Thrashers, etc, 
Length : 8.00-9.00. 
Adults: Upper parts brownish gray, indistinctly streaked; two narrow 
white wing-bars ; inner webs of two to four outer tail-feathers broadly 
tipped with white; under parts whitish, tinged with buffy on flanks 
