iS9*.] General Notes. 20I 



Nesting of the Golden Eagle in Arizona. — In 1866 I included this 

 Eagle among the birds of Arizona, but was without details of its occur- 

 rence in the Territory. Its permanent residence about Fort Whipple is 

 attested by my friend, Mr. H. H. Keays, who possesses two eggs taken 

 by himself from an eyrie on Thumb Butte, overlooking the city of Pres- 

 cott, March 2, 1891. This butte is the most notable landmark in the im- 

 mediate vicinity, forming an almost columnar mass of rock on top of a 

 small mountain, reached by a devious and somewhat difficult Indian trail 

 on the southern side. On reaching the top, and looking down a nearly 

 sheer wall for a hundred feet or more, Mr. Keays observed the female 

 Eagle on the nest. At no little risk of his life, he managed to descend to 

 the nest through a sort of crevice in the face of the rock, and with the 

 help of a pine tree that grew there, into whose top he first landed. The 

 eggs were fresh at the date mentioned. The eyrie was a very old one, 

 doubtless resorted to by many successive pairs of Eagles from time 

 out of mind, as attested by its great size, and the quantity of rabbit 

 skulls and other bones of rodents. — Elliott Coues, Fort Whipple, 

 Arizona. 



Melanerpes carolinus in Madison County, New York, in Winter. — In 



December, 1S85. I saw a Woodpecker which was unfamiliar to me, near 

 Peterboro, Madison Co., N. Y. The bird was on high ground, in the 

 midst of an extensive wood lot of large deciduous trees intermingled with 

 hemlocks and a few white pines. He was very shy, and soon flew to the 

 top of a tall pine from which my shot failed to dislodge him. My next 

 visit to the place was on February i6, 1886. This time I again saw the 

 bird, or one that I immediately recognized as belonging to the same 

 species. On the next day I secured the specimen. It proved to be an 

 adult male Melanerpes carolinus. The bird was in good condition, with 

 stomach well filled with fragments of beech nuts. 



Peterboro is fourteen miles south of Oneida Lake, and about 900 feet 

 above that body of water. — Gerrit S. Miller, Jr., Cambridge, Ma9s. 



The Whippoorwill Wintering near Charleston, South Carolina. — A fine 

 adult male of this bird was brought to me on February 7 of this year. 

 Upon skinning the bird, I was struck by finding it in fine condition. It 

 was very fat and nearly equalled shore birds in this respect. This is cer- 

 tainly' the first record of this species wintering in the State, and, as far as 

 I know, the first for the United States. — Arthur T. Wayne, Mt. 

 Pleasant, South Carolina. 



The Prairie Horned Lark {Otocoris alpestris fraticola) Breeding in 

 New Hampshire and Massachusetts. — That the Prairie Horned Lark is 

 gradually extending its breeding range eastward, recent records clearly 

 prove. The first account of its breeding in New England appeared in the 

 'Ornithologist and Oologist,' Vol. XIV, p. 87, June, 1889, where Mr. C. H. 

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