334 HOUSE WHEN. 



antagonist. With those of his own species, who settle and build 

 near him, he has frequent squabbles; and when their respective 

 females are sitting, each strains his whole powers of song to 

 excel the other. When the young are hatched, the hurry and 

 press of business leave no time for disputing, so true it is that 

 idleness is the mother of mischief. These birds are not confined 

 to the country; they are to be heard on the tops of the houses in 

 the most central part of our cities, singing with great energy. 

 Scarce a house or cottage in the country is without at least a 

 pair of them, and sometimes two; but unless where there is a 

 large garden, orchard, and numerous outhouses, it is not often 

 the case that more than one pair reside near the same spot, ow- 

 ing to their party disputes and jealousies. It has been said by a 

 friend to this little bird, that " the esculent vegetables of a whole 

 garden may, perhaps, be preserved from the depredations of 

 different species of insects, by ten or fifteen pair of these small 

 birds, "* and probably they might, were the combination prac- 

 ticable: but such a congregation of Wrens, about one garden, 

 is a phenomenon not to be expected but from a total change in 

 the very nature and disposition of the species. 



Having seen no accurate description of this bird in any Eu- 

 ropean publication, 1 have confined my references to Mr. Bar- 

 tram and Mr. Peale; but though Europeans are not ignorant of 

 the existence of this bird, they have considered it, as usual, 

 merely as a slight variation from the original stock (M. troglo- 

 dytes], their own Wren; in which they are, as usual, mistaken; 

 the length and bent form of the bill, its notes, migratory habits, 

 long tail, and red eggs, are sufficient specific differences. 



The House wren inhabits the whole of the United States, in 

 all of which it is migratory. It leaves Pennsylvania in Septem- 

 der; I have sometimes, though, rarely, seen it in the beginning 

 of October. It is four inches and a half long, and five and three- 

 quarters in extent, the whole upper parts of a deep brown, 

 transversely crossed with black, except the head and neck, 

 which is plain; throat, breast and cheeks light clay-colour; belly 

 * Barton's Fragments, Part i, f. 22. 



