SbrlF?e=1Flotes 



obscuring the white. My friend, in a note 

 accompanying the specimen, says that the 

 Japanese shrike has much the same habits 

 as ours, but he gives no particulars. 



In the scuppernong-vineyards and pear- 

 orchards of the Gulf-coast, shrikes and 

 mocking-birds live together apparently on 

 right easy terms. At nesting-time, how- 

 ever, the mockers drive the shrikes away 

 when they come too near their chosen 

 building-places. Doubtless, our little 

 butcher sometimes dines upon a fledgling 

 songster when the parent birds are absent 

 in search of food. I have known it to kill 

 young ones in a cage that hung out of 

 doors, and this — as I have told in another 

 paper — is the foundation of the belief that 

 mocking-birds feed their young poison 

 worms to kill them when in captivity. 

 The shrike is the real culprit, and is mis- 

 taken for the mocker, which it so closely 

 resembles in size and markings. 



Not long ago I saw it stated that some 

 peculiarly fortunate naturalist had been 

 hearing a shrike sing ; and a New England 

 woman wrote me that she, too, had lis- 



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