The Loggerhead Shrike 61 



and a large wild cherry tree. From the tree, a shrike flew 

 with unerring certainty to where they were shucking, eleven 

 times and each time caught and carried away a mouse. My 

 friend, Walter Campbell, a colored man, who formerly lived in 

 the south tells me that the colored people down there calls the 

 shrike the Mouse Hawk. And this confirms Wilson, the 

 American ornithologist, when he says it "inhabits the rice 

 plantations of Carolina and Georgia, where it is protected for 

 its usefulness in destroying mice." He adds, "It sits for 

 hours together, on the fence, beside the stacks of rice, watch- 

 ing like a cat ; and as soon as it perceives a mouse darts 

 on it like a hawk." It is with us when there is an abundance 

 of grasshoppers, beetles and other large insects and it destroys 

 many of these. It may be regarded as a very useful bird be- 

 cause of the great quantities of these which it destroys. 



