'172 Cooke on Ham's' s Finch. [October 



in late autumn, winter, and early spring, many White-throated 

 Sparrows congregate nightly for shelter in the dark recesses of 

 these shaggy evergreens. Ere they have settled for the night their 

 clear resonant notes fall upon the ear in confused rehearsal, but 

 they are subdued to gradual decadence with the deepening shad- 

 ows, until only now and then a single note breaks the stillness ; 

 then there is silence and night has fallen. 



THE DISTRIBUTION AND MIGRATION OF 

 ZONOTRICHIA ^UERULA. 



BY W. W. COOKE. 



While living in Northern Minnesota I shot a bird, late in the 

 fall, which was with difficulty identified. The 'Key' carried it 

 straight to Zonoti'ichia., but it had no white crown, no white 

 throat, and no black head ; hence, how could it belong there .? At 

 last it was discovered that, like the play of Hamlet with the part 

 of Hamlet left out, this was a Black-headed Sparrow minus the 

 black head. The acquaintance then formed has ripened into a 

 lasting friendship, and from that time the jaunty bird has been an 

 especial favorite. It came to me under several circumstances 

 tending to excite interest. • It was the first true western bird I had 

 ever seen, nor could I learn from any books at hand whence it 

 came or whither it went ; no one had ever seen its nest and eggs, 

 and even its winter home was but imperfectly known. For three 

 years its coming and going in the North were noted, and then 

 after quite a long separation it was again greeted last fall in its 

 winter home near the southern boundary of Indian Territory. As 

 might be expected, its movements during the winter were watched 

 quite carefully, and it is the intention of the present article to add 

 to these observations all that is now known of its distribution and 

 migration. 



Our subject was first described by Nuttall from Westport, Mo., 

 in 1840, and for the next thirty years not much was added to our 

 knowledge of it. Up to 1873 most of the notices respecting it 

 were from the Missouri River, along which it had been traced for 



