314 SINGING BIRDS. 



PAINTED BUNTING. 



nonpareil. 



Passerina ciris. 



Char. Male: head and neck blue; eyelids red; back yellowish 

 green ; rump red; wings dusky, glossed with green ; tail purplish brown : 

 below, vermilion. Female : above, olive ; below, buff ; wings and tail 

 dusky edged with olive. Length 5^ inches. 



Nest. In a thicket of low bushes ; compactly made of twigs, roots, 

 shreds of bark and grass, lined with fine grass or horse-hair, or fine roots. 



Eggs. 4-5 ; dull white, or with blue tint, marked chiefly around larger 

 end with purplish and reddish brown ; 0.80 X 0.60. 



This splendid, gay, and docile bird, known to the Americans 

 as the Nonpareil, and to the French Louisianians as the Pape, 

 inhabits the woods of the low countries of the Southern States, 

 in the vicinity of the sea and along the borders of the larger 

 rivers, from North Carolina to Mexico. It arrives from its 

 tropical quarters in Louisiana and Georgia from the middle 

 to the 20th of April ; but impatient of cold, retires to the 

 South early in October, and is supposed to winter about Vera 

 Cruz. For the sake of their song as well as beauty of plum- 

 age, these birds are commonly domesticated in the houses of 

 the French inhabitants of New Orleans and its vicinity ; and 

 some have succeeded in raising them in captivity, where plenty 

 of room was allowed in an aviary. They are familiar also in 

 the gardens and orchards, where their warbling notes are al- 

 most perpetually heard throughout the summer. Their song 

 m-uch resembles that of the Indigo Bird, but their voice is 

 more feeble and concise. Soon reconciled to the cage, they 

 will sing even a few days after being caught. Their food con- 

 sists of rice, insects, and various kinds of seeds ; they collect 

 also the grains of the ripe figs, and, frequenting gardens, build 

 often within a few paces of the house, being particularly 

 attached to the orangeries. 



Their nests are usually made in the hedges of the orange, or 

 on the lower branches of the same tree, likewise occasionally 

 in a bramble or thorny bush. In the mildest climates in which 



