92 WILD SCENES AND SONG-BIRDS. 



secure its prey, it would reascend to its perch, and emit loud 

 and discordant notes of anger. Whenever I could see it 

 strike its victim, it appeared to alight on its back and in- 

 stantly strike its head, which on such occasions I have sev- 

 eral times found torn open. If not disturbed, the shrike 

 would then tear up the body, and swallow in large pieces, 

 not well cleaned of the feathers, every part excepting the 

 wings. It now and then pursues birds that are on the wing 

 to a considerable distance. Thus, I saw one follow a turtle 

 dove, which, on being nearly caught, pitched on the ground, 

 when its skull was bruised in a moment ; but the next in- 

 stant both birds were in my possession." 



Now is not this a curious fact ? here we have the shrike 

 possessing not only the plumage of the mocking bird, but 

 even the weird power of imitation, and what makes the co- 

 incidence even yet more striking, it is a well-known and 

 standing amusement of the mocking bird to call together a 

 great number of small birds by some such trick as this, and 

 then frighten them nearly to death by shrieking like the 

 hawk in their midst. I have watched this droll manoeuvre 

 very many times. We shall show that the humming bird 

 only eats one insect the spider but lives principally upon 

 nectar of flowers, the food of that moth, which approaches it 

 most nearly in the order of being it has left behind. It can- 

 not live long upon the nectar alone, but its bird-nature re- 

 quires the animal juices of the spider to sustain it. Now this 

 butcher lives principally upon the same food as the mocking 

 bird, namely, grasshoppers, crickets, beetles, and small rep- 

 tiles, as it is a little stronger than the mocking bird ; but it 

 has to take even them cooked, for we have seen that it regu- 

 larly spits its lizards and other larger prey, to be basted by 

 the sun on the top of a thorn tree ! And I have time and 

 again witnessed the fact that it comes back regularly to feed 

 upon these extraordinary deposits in preference to the fresh 

 prey which it brings untorn to be basted in the same way by 

 the sun. 



