p. The flycatcher is, of all our summer birds, the 



most mute and the most familiar; it also appears 

 CatCheP the last of any. 



It builds in a vine, or a sweet-brier, against the 

 wall of a house, or in the hole of a wall, or on the end of a beam or 

 plate, and often close to the post of a door where people are going 

 in and out all day long. 



This bird does not make the least pretension to song, but uses a 

 little inward wailing note, when it thinks its young in danger from 

 cats and other annoyances. It breeds but once, and retires early. 



There is one circumstance characteristic of this bird which seems 

 to have escaped observation ; and that is, it takes its stand on the 

 top of some stake, or post, from whence it springs forth on its prey, 

 catching a fly in the air, and hardly ever touching the ground, but 

 returning still to the same stand for many times together. G. W. 



