224: FRIENDS WORTH KNOWING. 



surned. Even the lady-loves sometimes forget themselves so 

 far as to savagely attack their fancied rivals, o-r drive out of 

 sight the chosen mate of some male bird whom they want 

 for themselves. This is not all fancy, but lamentable fact. 

 Mademoiselle Oriole is not so showy as her gay beau. 

 Persuade the pair to keep quiet a moment, and compare 

 them. They are in size between a bluebird and a robin, 

 but rather more slender than either. The plumage of the 

 male is of a rich but varying orange upon all the lower 

 parts, underneath the wings, upon the lower part of the 

 back, and the outer edges of the tail; the throat, head, 

 neck, the part between the shoulders, wing quills, and mid- 

 dle tail feathers are velvety black ; the bill and feet are 

 bluish; there is a white ring around the eye, and the lesser 

 wing quills are edged with white. In the female the pat- 

 tern of color is the same, but the tints are duller. The jet 

 of the male's head and neck is rusty in his mate, and each 

 feather is margined with olive. The orange part of the 

 plumage is more like yellow in the female, and wing and 

 tail quills are spotted and dirty. Three years are required 

 for the orioles to receive their complete plumage, the grad- 

 ual change of which is beautifully represented in one of 

 Audubon's gigantic plates. " Sometimes the whole tail of 

 a [young] male individual in spring is yellow, sometimes 



