GREAT AMERICAN SHRIKE. 147 



and bushes, where it shrivels in the sun, and soon becomes 

 equally useless to the hoarder. Both retain the same habits in 

 a state of confinement, whatever the food may be that is present- 

 ed to them. 



This habit of the Shrike of seizing and impaling grasshoppers, 

 and other insects, on thorns, has given rise to an opinion, that 

 he places their carcasses there, by way of baits, to allure small 

 birds to them, while he himself lies in ambush to surprise and 

 destroy them. In this, however, they appear to allow him a 

 greater portion of reason and contrivance than he seems entitled 

 to, or than other circumstances will altogether warrant; for we 

 find that he not only serves grasshoppers in this manner, but 

 even small birds themselves, as those have assured me who 

 have kept them in cages in this country, and amused them- 

 selves with their manoeuvres. If so, we might as well suppose 

 the farmer to be inviting Crows to his corn, when he hangs 

 up their carcasses around it, as the Butcher-bird to be decoy- 

 ing small birds by a display of the dead bodies of their comrades ! 



In the " Transactions of the American Philosophical Socie- 

 ty," vol. iv, p. 124, the reader may find a long letter on this 

 subject, from Mr. John Heckewelder, of Bethlehem, to Dr. 

 Barton; the substance of which is as follows: That on the 17th 

 of December, 1795, he (Mr. Heckewelder) went to visit a 

 young orchard, which had been planted a few weeks before, 

 and was surprised to observe on every one of the trees one, 

 and on some, two and three grasshoppers, stuck down on the 

 sharp thorny branches; that on inquiring of his tenant the reason 

 of this, he informed him, that they were stuck there by a small 

 bird of prey called by the Germans Neuntoedter (Ninekiller,) 

 which caught and stuck nine grasshoppers a day; and he sup- 

 posed that as the bird itself never fed on grasshoppers, it must 

 do it for pleasure. Mr. Heckewelder now recollected that one 

 of those Ninekillers had, many years before, taken a favourite 

 bird of his out of his cage, at the window; since which he had 

 paid particular attention to it; and being perfectly satisfied that 

 it lived entirely on mice and small birds, and, moreover, ob- 



