BIRDS OF YAKUTAT BAY 



and colored a brilliant red. The female lacks the swelling 

 of the beak and is dull grayish-brown in color. 



Next a flock of Arctic terns was seen slender, pale- 

 gray and pearl-blue, swallow-like cousins of the gulls, 

 with long forked tails, black caps, and sharp, carmine-col- 

 ored bills. They were airily fluttering over the water and 

 splashing in every now and then for a fish. Their high, 

 creaking rattle of a cry was constantly uttered as they 

 fluttered and gyrated over the spot where a school of 

 small fish was swimming. 



We rowed to the settlement, which is composed of 

 houses built in the most hideously modern fashion with 

 clapboards and paint, and, upon landing, strolled off into 

 a partly cleared spot where birds seemed plentiful. Here 

 Mr. Ridgway found a race of song sparrow he had recently 

 described, and collected such specimens as he needed for 

 further studies. Townsend's sparrow was also abundant 

 and in full song. We heard the bright notes of the sum- 

 mer warbler and found the pileolated warbler in numbers. 

 This golden sylph with its cap of black has a dainty though 

 rather jerky song, a fine, rapidly uttered pipe tsi-tsi-tsi- 

 tsi-tsi! The dwarf hermit thrush uttered its silvery gurg- 

 ling song every now and then tive'-ti-twe-dle-de-dle! 

 and occasionally from the forest we heard the strain of 

 the ruby-crowned kinglet a surprisingly loud and clear 

 song for so small a bird. The lutescent warbler, in olive- 

 green and dull yellow, trilled amid the bushes, a strain not 

 unlike that of the chipping sparrow, but not so high-pitched 

 and prolonged. Altogether there was a merry chorus 

 about the Indian village which did much to atone for the 

 prosaic appearance of the settlement. 



On the following day Mr. Ridgway and I again went 

 for a ramble, taking advantage of a lull in the rain, that 

 fell much of the time we were in camp, and were re- 

 warded by the sight of several previously undetected birds. 



