CHIPPING SPARROW. 335 



seldom so thick but that it may be readily seen through, is 

 composed of dry stalks of withered grass, and lined more or 

 less with horse or cow hair. The Cuckoo destroys many eggs 

 of this timid, harmless, and sociable little bird, as the nests are 

 readily discovered and numerous ; on such occasions the little 

 sufferer expresses great and unusual anxiety for the security of 

 her charge, and after being repeatedly robbed, the female sits 

 closely sometimes upon perhaps only two eggs, desirous at any 

 rate to escape if possible with some of her little offspring. Two 

 or more broods are raised in the season. 



Towards the close of summer the parents and their brood 

 are seen busily engaged collecting seeds and insects in the 

 neighboring fields and lanes, and now become so numerous, as 

 the autumn advances, that flitting before the path on either 

 side as the passenger proceeds, they almost resemble the 

 falling leaves of the season rustling before the cheerless blast ; 

 and finally, as their food fails and the first snows begin to 

 appear, advertised of the threatening famine, they disappear 

 and winter in the Southern States. In the month of January, 

 in Georgia, during the continuance of the cool weather and 

 frosty nights, I frequently heard at dusk a confused chirping or 

 piping like that of frogs, and at length discovered the noise to 

 proceed from dense flocks of the Chipping Sparrows roosting 

 or huddling near together in a pile of thick brush, where, with 

 the Song Sparrow also, they find means to pass the cool 

 nights. The Chipping Sparrow occurs throughout the Mari- 

 time Provinces and westward to the Rockies and northward to 

 the Great Slave Lake region. It is abundant in Quebec and 

 Ontario. 



Note. — One example of Brewer's Sparrow {Spizella 

 breweri), a bird that dwells chiefly on the western slopes of the 

 Rockies, has been taken in Massachusetts. 



