470 NATURAL HISTORY OF BIRDS. 



capricious and extraordinary forms as the tropics usually produce, and a cursory 

 glance at the more conspicuous species will soon convince us of the truth hereof. 



Foremost in beauty among the tyrants is the graceful 'scissor-tail' (Milvulus for- 

 ficatus) which inhabits Central America and some of our southern states west of the 

 Mississippi. This bird is about as large as our common king-bird, but the tail or 

 more correctly the three, and more especially the two, lateral pairs of tail-feathers 4 

 is enormously lengthened, the length of the tail in a specimen before me being ten 

 inches and a half, while the body without the tail is not more than four inches long. 

 The coloration is quite unique, being above of a very delicate and light hoary gray, 

 underneath nearly pure white, but on the flanks washed with a most exquisite salmon 

 red, which on the lower tail-coverts and the outer rectrices fad.es into a lovely rosy 

 tinge, while the feathers surrounding the insertion of the wing and those forming 

 the concealed crown patch are fiery scarlet. A few remarks on the habits of this 

 splendid member of our North American fauna may be welcome, hence we transcribe 

 the following from Lieutenant McCauley's notes on the birds of the Red River, 

 Texas : 



" This peculiarly beautiful and graceful bird was one of the species most frequently 

 seen. They were especially active in the evening, just before dusk, skimming about 

 in pursuit of insects with wonderful rapidity. As the males fly about the camp with 

 their mates, in the twilight, you can single them out by the greater length of their 

 tails. The two elegant feathery tines cross and open at volition, whence the ordinary 

 simile to a pair of scissors. These birds are grace itself when on wing, darting here 

 and there as quick as thought, in buoyant sweeps and curves. Even the teamsters 

 call them ' mighty pretty,' and no one wonders that the ' Texicans ' brag on their 

 beauty, and call them ' birds-of-Paradise.' They were found frequenting the fringe 

 of timber bordering the streams as far as their head-waters in the Staked Plain, as 

 well as along the streams in the Indian Territory, all draining portions of the Arkan- 

 sas Basin. They ruled the wood wherever located, and not only repelled, but hotly 

 pursued, any sparrow-hawk that ventured near their homes, and even maintained au- 

 thority over the king-bird." 



Other forms with extremely lengthened outer tail-feathers are the large and hand- 

 some Gubernetes yetapa from Brazil, gray with a dark chestnut band beneath the white 

 throat, and Alectrurus psalurus, in which the external rectrices are denuded at the base, 

 and the webs are turned vertically. The other member of this genus (A. tricolor) 

 has the tail folded as in the domestic fowl, and the inner webs of the middle rectrices 

 enormously broadened and raised above the rest. 



The genus Tcenioptera and its allies both in form and coloration sti'ongly remind. one 

 of the Old World Saxicolce, of which the white-ear is a familiar representative ; while 

 the kinglets are personated by the thin-billed, exceedingly beautiful, small Gyanotis, 

 the head of which is ornamented with no less than six bright colors in the following 

 order: chin white; ear-patch blackish indigo; superciliary stripe yellow and green; 

 top of head black, relieved in the middle by a beautiful crown of the brightest scarlet 

 orange, a color which also pervades the itnder tail-coverts. Here also belongs the 

 interesting Anceretes albocristatus, a bird which in size and color closely resembles 

 our black-and-white creeping warbler (Mniotilta), but which has a white crown, bor- 

 dered on each side by a curious horn-like feather-tuft above each eye, somewhat after 

 the fashion of certain owls. 



The central group is occupied by a large number of species of small or medium 



