iS86.] M.K\KNS OH the Birds of Ari'zotia. -^97 



in hand a fine suite of Red-vented Thrashers when my little 

 library arrived ; then I was astonished, on turning to Dr. Coues's 

 'Birds of the Colorado Valley,' to read at the commencement of 

 his account of this species: "i have never seen the bird alive." 

 This is a remarkable instance of the possibility of a common spe- 

 cies being overlooked, even in the midst of its distributional 

 centre ; for I have repeatedly found it but a few miles from Fort 

 Whipple (but at considerably lower altitude), where Dr. Coues 

 was stationed at different times ; and at Verde the species is 

 always common, and nests each year in a patch of mesquite 

 within a hundred yards of the quarters he occupied when Post 

 Surgeon here. 



On February iS, iSS6, wishing to have a fresh example of this 

 species in hand when writing its description, I had but to take 

 iny gun and stroll into the nearest mesquite thicket and shoot a 

 specimen, which proved to be a female. When skinning it the 

 next day, I suspected that it had already oviposited even at this 

 early date, and upon dissecting it obtained positive proof that it 

 had laid two eggs. The next morning I returned to the place 

 where I shot the specimen, and immediately found its nest in the 

 mesquite-bush whence it was first flushed two days before. The 

 male parent was sitting upon the eggs, but slipped nimbly to the 

 ground and ran out of view among the shrubbery, and was only 

 secured after several visits made to the nest during the day. These 

 specimens being in perfect plumage were selected for the types 

 of the foregoing description. During the thirty days preceding 

 the discovery of this nest, the lowest temperature of each twenty- 

 four hours, taken with the minimum thermometer, averaged 33° 

 F., with extremes of 34° and 43° F. ; and the temperature for the 

 same period, taken with the maximum thermometer, averaged 

 67° F., with extremes of 75° and 55° F. The nest was saddled 

 upon the fork of a mesquite-bush, aboutfour feet from the ground, 

 in part supported by the thorny branches of a neighboring bush. 

 It rested upon a pile of sticks, and was surrounded by a bristling 

 array of spiny 'haw' and mesquite twigs of moderate size ; within 

 this barricade the nest proper was placed ; it is bowl-shaped, and, 

 with the exception of a few feathers, composed entirely of vege- 

 table substances very neatly felted into a compact, warm nest. 

 The principal materials are fine withered grass, stems of plants, 

 and shreddy inner bark. Externally it measures 150 mm. in 



