Some Naturalized Foreigners 



escape outside the publisher's windows, may have 

 had something to do with their perfect content. 

 Passers-by would look up at the sound of their un- 

 familiar musical whistle two long-drawn, high, 

 clear notes, the last a trifle higher than the first 

 and see an unfamiliar black bird, suggesting a 

 grackle, but with a short, square tail, which empha- 

 sized the length and point of the wings. Seen at 

 close range at the nesting season, the plumage is 

 glossy black brightly shot with purple, green, and 

 steel-blue iridescence. After the annual molt new 

 feathers come in tipped with buff, which makes the 

 plumage look heavily speckled at first. Gradually 

 it is more lightly sprinkled with dots, as the mark- 

 ings wear off, until the bird is wholly black in time 

 to go a -wooing. Then his bill becomes bright 

 yellow. 



With us the starling is a permanent resident. 

 From Staten Island and the opposite New Jersey 

 and Long Island shores up the Hudson thirty miles 

 or more, and along the Sound as far as New Haven, 

 Connecticut, it is slowly extending its range. Noisy 

 broods are reared in tree hollows preferably. Seen 

 in flight, the bird appears triangular, owing to the 

 wide stretch of its long wings and its short tail, 

 whereas the grackle's long steering gear is its most 

 characteristic feature. Sailing for some little dis- 

 tance before alighting, the starling finally settles in 

 large, open spaces and walks over the ground - 

 crow fashion. On the South Downs of England 

 I have watched it familiarly riding on the sheeps' 

 backs, looking for pests imbedded in the fleece, or 

 walking through the fields after the plow, devouring 



213 



