WILSON AND CONTEMPORARY AMERICANS 8l 



be a Muscicapa from it's bill, as well as from the 

 following circumstance. Two or three days be- 

 fore my arrival here a neighbor killed a bird, un- 

 known to him, & never before seen here as far as 

 he could learn, it was brought to me soon after I 

 arrived; but in the dusk of the evening, and so 

 putrid that it could not be approached but with 

 disgust. But I obtained a sufficiently exact idea 

 of it's form and colours to be satisfied it is the 

 same with yours, the only difference I find in 

 yours is that the white on the back is not so pure, 

 and that the one I saw had a little of a crest. 

 Your figure, compared with the white bellied 

 Gobemouche 8 Buff 342, PI. enlum 566 shews a 

 near relation. Buffon's is dark on the back, 



"As you are curious in birds there is one well 

 worthy your attention, to be found or rather 

 heard in every part of America, & yet scarcely 

 ever to be seen. It is in all the forests from spring 

 to fall, and never but on the tops of the tallest 

 trees from which it perpetually serenades us with 

 some of the sweetest notes, & as clear as those of 

 the nightingale. I have followed it miles without 

 ever but once getting a good view of it. it is the 

 size and make of the Mocking bird, lightly thrush- 

 colored on the back, & a grayish white on the 

 breast & belly, mr. Randolph, my son-in-law, was 

 in possession of one which had been shot by a 

 neighbor, he pronounced this also a Muscicapa, 

 and I think it much resembling the Moucherolle 

 de la Martinique 8 Buffon 374 pi. enlum 658. as 

 it abounds in all the neighborhood of Philadelphia, 

 6 



