

NOTES BY THE WAY 



pear to carry the case by storm. The same proceed- 

 ing may be observed among the English sparrows, 

 now fairly established on our soil. Two or three 

 males beset a female, and a regular scuffle ensues. 

 The poor bird is pulled and jostled and cajoled 

 amid what appears to be the greatest mirth and 

 hilarity of her audacious suitors. Her plumage is 

 plucked and ruffled; the rivals roll over each other 

 and over her; she extricates herself as best she can, 

 and seems to say or scream "no," "no," to every 

 one of them with great emphasis. What finally 

 determines her choice would be hard to say. Our 

 own sparrows are far less noisy and obstreperous, 

 but the same little comedy in a milder form is often 

 enacted among them. When two males have a tilt, 

 they rise several feet in the air, beak to beak, and 

 seek to deal each other blows as they mount. I 

 have seen two male chewinks facing each other 

 and wrathfully impelled upward in the same man- 

 ner, while the female that was the bone of conten- 

 tion between them regarded them unconcernedly 

 from the near bushes. 



The bobolink is also a precipitate and impetuous 

 wooer. It is a trial of speed, as if the female were 

 to say, " Catch me and I am yours," and she scur- 

 ries away with all her might and main, often with 

 three or four dusky knights in hot pursuit. When 

 she takes to cover in ' the grass, there is generally 

 a squabble " down among the tickle-tops," or under 

 151 



