MIMUS. 



M1NKK.U, VKINS. 



to become a matter of mutual consideration. The orange, the fig, 

 the pear-tree of the gardens, are inspected ; the thick briar patches 

 are also visited. They appear to be well-suited for the purpose in 

 view ; and so well don the bird know that man is not his most danger- 

 cm enemy, that, instead of retiring from him, they at length fix their 

 abode in his vicinity, perhaps in the nearest tree to his window. 

 Dried twigs, leaves, grasses, cotton, flax, and other substances are 

 picked up, carried to a forked branch, and there arranged. The female 

 has laid an egg, and the male redoubles bis caresses. Five eggs are 

 deposited in due time, when the male, having little more to do than 

 to sing his mate to repose, attunes his pipe anew. Every now and 

 then he spies an insect on the ground, the taste of which he is sure 

 will please his beloved one. He drops upon it, takes it in his bill, 

 beats it against the earth, and flies to the nest to feed and receive the 

 Warm thanks of his devoted female." 



The eggs are pale-green, blutclied and spotted nearly all over with 

 umber-brown. The female sits 14 days. 



Mocking Bird (Uimiu polyylottta). 



The enemies of the Mocking Bird are cats, the Falco Slanldi, and 

 makes, especially the Black Snake, which Wilson describes as the 

 mortal enemy of our songster's eggs and young, and as the object of 

 his especial and deadly vengeance ; for the bird rarely leaves his foe, 

 when he has found him, alive. " Children," says Audubon, " seldom 

 destroy the nest* of these birds, and the planters generally protect 

 them. So much does this feeling prevail throughout Louisiana, that 

 they will not willingly permit a Mocking Bird to be shot at any time." 



The food of this species consists, according to Wilson, of the berries 

 of the red cedar, myrtle, holly, and many species of Smilar, together 

 with gum-berries, gall-berries, and a profusion ,of others with which 

 the swampy thickets abound, as well as winged insects, of which it is 

 exceedingly f<md. 



" The Mocking Bird," says Wilson, " inhabits a very oonoiderable 

 extent of both North and South America, having been traced from the 

 state* of New England to Brazil, and also among many of the adjacent 

 islands; much more numerous in those states south than in those north 

 of the river Delaware, being generally migratory in the latter, and 

 resident (at least many of them) in the former. A warm climate and 

 low country, not far from the sea, seem most congenial to their nature ; 

 accordingly we find the species less numerous to the west than east 

 of the great range of the AUeghany, in the same parallels of latitude. 

 In the severe winter of 1808-9 I found these birds occasionally from 

 Predcricksburg in Virginia to the southern parts of Georgia." 



Nnttall states that it inhabit* the whole continent and the adjacent 

 island*, from Kbode Island to the larger islands of the West Indies, 

 continuing through the equatorial regions and as far south as Brazil. 

 Nor is it confined to the eastern or Atlantic states ; for it is found 

 in the State of Arkansas, and more than a thousand miles from 

 the mouth of Red River. Say notice* it as breeding at the western 

 sources of the Platte, near the base of the llocky Mountains. Bullock 

 saw it on the table-land of Mexico. Mr. Litchfield informed Nuttall 

 that it is commonly heard in Venezuela. 



Mr. Darwin ('Journal and Remarks') notices, in his account of 

 Maldonado, a Hocking-Bird, Orpktut modulator, called by the inhabit- 

 ants C aland ria, as remarkable for possessing a song far superior to 

 that of any other bird in the country : indeed it was nearly the only 

 bird in South America which he observed to take it* stand for the 

 purpose of singing. He compares the song to that of the Sedge- 

 Warbler, but saj that it is more powerful, and that some harsh notes 



and some very high ones are mingled with a pleasant warbling. It is 

 heard only during spring : at other times its cry is harsh, and far from 

 harmonious. He states that near Maldonado these birds were taine 

 and bold, constantly attending the country-houses in numbers, to pick 

 the meat which was hung up on the posU or walls ; but if any other 

 small bird approached, the Calaudria drove it away. Mr. Darwin adds, 

 that, on the wide uninhabited plains of Patagonia, another closely 

 allied species, Orpkeiu 1'atayaniciu of D'Orbiguy, which frequents the 

 valleys clothed with spiny bushes, is a wilder bird, and has a slightly 

 different tone of voice. (' Voyages of H.M.S. Adventure and Beagle,' 

 vol. iii.) 



Mr. Swainson (' Fauna Boreali- Americana, 1 vol. ii., and ' Classifica- 

 tion of Birds,' voL ii.) notices the striking analogy between the Mock- 

 ing Bird and Laniut C'arolinnuu (the Loggerheaded Shrike). Both 

 the birds, he remarks, are typical examples of two distinct groups : 

 they are of the same size, clothed in nearly the same coloured plumage, 

 seek the same kind of food, agree in the structure of their wings and 

 tail (almost in that of their feet), build the same kind of nest and in 

 similar situations, imitate the notes of other birds, eject their unser- 

 viceable food in the same manner, and yet, iu his opinion, are totally 

 distinct in real affinity. 



The term ' Mock-Bird' is sometimes used to designate the Sedge- 

 Bird (Curruca talicaria of Fleming, Sylvia Phragmitii of Bechstein, 

 Culamodyta Phragmitii of Bonaparte) ; and that of Mock-Nightingale 

 is sometimes applied to the Black-Cap [BLACK-CAP], and also to the 

 Fauvette, Cttrruca hortetuit, Br. and Flem., Mulacilla hortauii, Om., 

 Sylria, hortentii, Bechst. 



MIMUSOPS, a genus of Plants belonging to the natural order 

 Sapotacctr. It has a calyx 0- to 8-parted ; segments disposed in a twin 

 order; corolla with a double row of segments, the outer row containing 

 from to 16 in number, which are either entire or divided, the inner 

 row containing 6 or 8 entire segment* ; antheriferous stamens 6 or 8, 

 opposite the inner segments of the corolla, alternating with as many 

 sterile ones ; ovarium 6-8-celled ; berry 1- or few-seeded from abortion. 

 The species are trees with alternate quite-entire glabrous coriaceous 

 leaves, and axillary fascicles of 1-flowored pedicels. The flowers are 

 small and white ; the fruit edible. 



M. Klmiji has oval-lanceolate or oblong leaves, acuminated, glabrous ; 

 pedicels many together, shorter than the petioles, which are glabrouf. 

 It is a native of the East Indies, where it is much planted on account 

 of its fragrant flowers, which come out chiefly iu the hot season. A 

 fragrant water is distilled from the flowers. The seeds yield an 

 abundance of oil in request for painters. The leaves are said to produce 

 an extraordinary noise when burnt. 



M. Kaki hag obovate leaves, very blunt, silvery or hoary beneath, 

 hardly three times as long as the petioles, crowded at the ends of the 

 branches ; flowers fascicled, hexandrous. It is a native of the East 

 Indies and Australia within the tropic. The tree yields a gum, and the 

 fruit has a sweetish taste, and is much eaten by the natives of India. 



(Don, JHMamydeoui J'lanti; Lindley, Vegetable Kingdom.) 



MINERAL VEINS. The principal inorganic constituents of the 

 crust of the earth are in general capable of arrangement as the products 

 of water or of heat; and to each of these classes belong peculiar 

 characteristic features of composition, aggregation, and arrangement. 

 The product* of water are mostly laid in the form of strata ; the pro- 

 ducts of heat are often seen to cross, penetrate, and overlie or underlie 

 these layers of rock, iu dykes or in huge amorphous masses. But 

 there is a third lesa distinctly limited class of aggregations in the crust 

 of tin- earth, whose form U different from either of the preceding 

 types, and whose origin, though perhaps not independent either of 

 heat or water, is yet not to be understood without the consideration 

 of other and peculiar conditions. Such are metallic and mineral veins, 

 spar veins, and other crystallised and concretionary accumulations, 

 common in both stratified and amorphous rocks, under a great variety 

 of circumstances, the essential conditions of which appear however to 

 be few in number. To ascertain these conditions is the first object of 

 a philosphical inquiry into the origin of mineral veins; for the laws 

 of the phenomena may thus become correctly known, and the true 

 theory, the ultimate end of the inquiry, be satisfactorily indicated. 



The most frequent form in which metallic and mineral veins occur 

 is that of a vertical or slightly inclined mass, occupying what was 

 once a fissure, or narrow open space, traversing the stratified or amor- 

 phous rocks for a variable but often considerable length horizontally, 

 and a limited or unknown depth in a perpendicular direction. This 

 is called a Rake Vein. Occasionally the mineral masse* are found 

 arranged iu a narrow vertical or oblique tubular form, like an irregu- 

 larly expanded chimney, traversing the strata: such are sometimes 

 called Pipe Veins. From these two sorts of veins parts occasionally 

 pass Literally, and are called Flat Veins, and there are frequently 

 ramifications from all of them, called Strings, and wholly or almost 

 detached lumps, or bunches, or nests, of ore and spar, in the contiguous 

 rocks. 



Now the general condition of all these occurrences is the existence, 

 anteriorly to the accumulation of the metallic and sparry substances 

 in the rake, pipe, flat, 4c., of a cavity in the substance of the rocks, 

 or a separation between the bods or blocks of stone. The same forms 

 of occurrence belong to various spars and other substances, and the 

 same general condition is predicablc of them. That cavities really did 



