1 66 LIFE-HISTORIES OF 



The flight of this bird is lo\v, gliding", and 

 moderately sustained. 



During its brief stay of a week it is apparently 

 silent; not so much as a simple call has it been 

 heard to utter. Coming alone and being a solitary 

 and voracious feeder, its attention is so completely 

 engrossed with appetital gratification, that other 

 influences are temporarily held in abeyance. Its 

 call-note is said by Mr. Audubon to resemble that 

 of Spiza cirls, but difficult to distinguish; but its 

 song of three syllables is loud, cheerful and agree- 

 able, and resembles wcst,ivset,w:etec. The species 

 is pre-eminently vocal in the spring, so says the 

 sirne writer, but ceases altogether at the time of 

 the first hatching; its song is resumed when the^ 

 mate is again sitting on her second set of egg-s. 



Its food consists of beetles, two-winged flies, 

 and lepidoptera, principally. Although chiefly 

 aerial, so to speak, in foraging for food, it is never- 

 theless, both arboreal and terrestrial. The fol- 

 lowing insects constitute a portion of its volumin- 

 ous bill of fare: Cymindis viridipennis, Donacia 

 metallica, D. co&flitciita, Bostrichus pini, Chryso- 

 mela c&ruleipennis, Casnonia pmnsylvanica and 

 C^dex taeniorhynchus, among diptera; Apis mclli- 

 fica, Formica sanguined, F. subterranea, Selandria 

 rostz, Megachile centuncularis, and various species 

 of Halictus among hymenoptera; Utetheisa bclla, 

 Lithosia miniala, Anisopteryx veniala, in larval 

 state, mature forms of Spilosoma Virginica, and 

 many of the smaller Noctuida and Tineida ; besides 

 various species of aphides and spiders. 



