ANIMAL LIFE ABOUT DUNFORD'S FARM 287 



not only remarkably like a thrush in shape, but has also 

 many of the peculiar habits and contortions of one. The 

 common song-thrush has a peculiar trick of twisting and 

 fluttering in the bottom of a hedge which is indescribable 

 on paper. The robin of .England has a ■precisely similar 

 trick. The object of the bird in either case I have not 

 been able to discover. Perhaps it is a case of mimicry. 

 At all events there is, in my opinion, some excuse for the 

 vulgar but popular name of T. canadensis; for it is as 

 much like a robin, size set aside, as a thrush. 



The American robin, as we will call it, is about the 

 size of a blackbird. The upper parts are a bluish grey 

 colour, the under a sort of orange, or rust colour, which, 

 no doubt, was the chief reason for bestowing its popular 

 name upon it. The primaries and head, neck, and tail are 

 blackish brown ; and the breast and belly of the female 

 are bufiish brown instead of orange. The plumage of the 

 bird varies in some de^ee in different localities, and there 

 is also a seasonal change. I first saw the bird in Red 

 River Colony (Manitoba) and other parts of the Great 

 North- West ; and afterwards odd birds, or small flocks, in 

 nearly every part of Canada visited by me. In the United 

 States it is very extensively distributed. I saw it in all 

 the Northern States east of the Rocky Mountains, but it 

 is not found in any of the Southern States. 



It is a sociable bird, often seen about the farms, 

 homesteads, and villages ; and there were several nests in 

 Mr. Dunford's orchard, built in fruit-trees close to the 

 house. Bushes and fruit-trees are its favourite nesting 

 places, and the nest is usually placed ten or twelve feet 

 from the ground. It breeds rather early in the spring, 

 and when I arrived here the nestlings had already taken 

 wing and were often seen, together with the old birds, 

 hopping about the farm-yard ; and on one occasion I even 

 saw a robin in the dairy picking up the crumbs that lay 

 in the sink. Robins are held in as much favour and awe 

 by American country-people as redbreasts are by the 

 peasantry of England ; yet in towns, as in Boston, Trenton, 



