130 RAMBLES ABOUT HOME. 



the conclusion is drawn that, where a nest is so construct- 

 ed as to conceal the sitting bird, the occupant, in all such 

 cases, is of bright, showy plumage, and would easily be 

 detected' by birds of prey, if not concealed when on the 

 nest. Of the family Icteridce, to which the Baltimore ori- 

 ole belongs, Mr. Wallace says : " The red or yellow and 

 black plumage of most of these birds is very conspicuous, 

 and is exactly alike in both sexes. [This is not true of 

 the Baltimore oriole, the female of which is much less 

 brightly colored.] They are celebrated for their fine, 

 purse-shaped, pensile nests." Now, there are two consid- 

 erations worthy of attention with reference to this bird 

 and the character of its nest. In the first place, as the 

 male bird is much brighter than the female in its plum- 

 age, would it not require a concealing nest if it assisted 

 in incubation ? Now, does the male bird take part in 

 covering the eggs ? Unquestionably it does. Secondly, 

 if the bird-concealing nest, a " pendulous and nearly cy- 

 lindrical pouch," is constructed solely with reference to 

 the protection of the parent birds, would it not be within 

 the range of probabilities that, no danger existing, the 

 labor of constructing so elaborate a nest would be aban- 

 doned ? Has this actually occurred ? 



During the summer of 1872, 1 found nine nests of the 

 Baltimore oriole within a comparatively small area ; in 

 1873, I succeeded in finding seventeen nests in an area 

 nearly ten times as large ; and during the summer of 

 1874 I found thirteen nests in an area of the same extent 

 as that examined in 1873. 



These thirty-nine nests I classified as follows : of the 

 nine examined in 1872, six were so constructed as to ef- 

 fectually conceal the sitting bird, arid three were suffi- 

 ciently open at the top to give a hawk hovering above it 

 a view of the occupant. 



