RECORDS VOr-UMK XI, OCT. 1919. 139 



closed car, however, and did not mind the weather espec- 

 ially. Neither Mrs Dewis nor I had ever been over this 

 part of the (3ape before, and every bit of the country — 

 both the landscape and the towns — was of great interest. 

 We had with us Mrs. Dewis' aunt. >Jrs. R. R. McLeod. 

 who&e-husband 1 think you knew, and her knowfedge of 

 birds, trees, and liowers added much to the pleasure of 

 ihe trip. 



We saw land birds all abnig the way and very niaoy 

 Herring Gulls when near the shore, especially in the bay 

 at Provincetown. but no Black-backs and no Terns. I did 

 not attempt to identify any of the Fmaller biids such as 

 you would see from a train until we got to Proviucetcwn 

 There 1 got out, and the tlrst bird I saw in a little pine 

 tree at the extreme eastern end of the town, was a Red- 

 breasted Nuthatch, and then another and another until I 

 had counted twenty-two. Then there were more, proba- 

 bly many more. These were the first I had seen since the 

 migration of September of last year at Monhegan Island. 

 I saw a great many there, but no such crowd at one time 

 as this at Provincetown. They seemed everywhere in 

 these young pine trees, and they were jnst as business- 

 like as usual. No periods of contemplative quiet At 

 times, there was a regular conversation of "'yna, yna" as 

 Chapman gives it. Certainly there is a big difference be- 

 tween their softer notes and the harsher '"yank" of the 

 White-breasted Nuthatch. 1 have never read that these 

 birds had the Flycatcher habit, but now and then one 

 would fly out just like a Kingbird orPewee, at something, 

 and I saw one with a locust in his beak though I did not 

 see him catch it. When I detected him with it he was on 

 the board fence post, and he flew up on the crosspiece of a 



