270 NOTES ON THE 
By the twentieth of April the nests are generally finished 
and incubation fairly entered upon. The nest is placed in the 
fork of a tall tree, pine where that kind of timber grows, and 
consists of a thick course of sticks and twigs, overlaid by 
moss, barks of different kinds, or dried grass, and well lined 
with bark and leaves. Four eggs is usually the complement, 
colored some shade of green and covered with splotches of 
different shades of brown, and dusky. One brood only is 
reared. 
I am afraid I cannot add anything to the welfare of this 
bird economically considered. The weight of testimuny is all 
against him. He must understand that the waste places of the 
earth only are voted him henceforth and forever. In common | 
with all of the other members of the family he has got a bad 
name. 
SPECIFIC CHARACTERS. 
Bill much compressed; curved from the base, rather more 
so towards the tip; incumbent feathers of nostrils reach half 
the distance from the base of the bill to the end of the lower 
mandible, and not quite half way to that of the upper; fourth 
quill longest, second shorter than sixth, first shorter than 
ninth; glossy black with violet reflections, even on the belly; 
tarsus longer than the middle toe and claw and has eight 
scales anteriorly; the lateral toes are very nearly equal; the 
inner claw the larger and reaching to the base of the middle 
claw; the webs of the throat feather are a little loose, but lie 
quite smoothly without the pointed, lanceolate character seen 
in the ravens. 
Length, 19 to 20; wing, 18 to 13.5; tail, 8. 
Habitat, North America from fur countries to Mexico. 
CORVUS OSSIFRAGUS Witson. (490.) 
FISH CROW. 
The appearance of this species in Minnesota of course was 
accidental. On September 21st, 1869, I was driving in the 
vicinity of this city near a small lake, when a flock of what I 
calculated were not less than a hundred and fifty crows passed 
over me from the north and lighted on a plowed field close to 
the road along which I was driving. Several of our common 
crows were feeding on the same field, which possibly was the 
immediate cause of their alighting, but the contrast in size 
arrested my attention before they stopped their flight. The 
most ordinary observer could not have failed to see the differ- 
ence in their sizes. Having my field glass with me I stopped 
