102 THE OOLOGIST 
MEXICAN BIRDS. 
A personal letter from George HE. 
LaGrange, a nephew of the Editor at 
present a Senior in Stanford Universi- 
ty at Palo Alto, California, tells many 
interesting things of some of the birds 
of Vera Cruz, Mexico, where he spent 
most of the past summer. It in part 
reads as follows: 
“T think practically all the birds are 
different, even the Buzzards. I know 
the Blackbirds are—they have tails, 
regular fans; while the birds are fully 
half again as large as our Purple 
Grackle. They are very plentiful and 
very tame——as in fact all wild game is 
in Mexico. Nothing of this sort is 
molested by the natives. 
In Vera Cruz the blackbirds seem to 
come, one, each and every egg-hatched 
nigger amongst them, to the central 
plaza of the city to roost in the trees 
to be found there. Every evening, as 
sure as the sun approaches the west- 
ern horizon, they begin to assemble. 
Singly, in families and tribes, almost 
in battalions, they flock in to begin 
their nightly squabble for a piece of 
green limb two inches long and free 
from branches and leaves—and other 
blackbirds—upon Which they may pre-. 
pare, to begin, to get ready, to com- 
mwence, to roost for the night. For it 
is one thing to have and another to 
held. And although the good little 
early bird who retires in proper sea- 
son, may select and stake out his 
claim for 2 roost, he must be prepared 
to defend it against every new comer 
and late comer until long after sun- 
down. Jumping of claims is well 
known in the genera of blackbirds, 
nor is there any rule to the game ex- 
cept hold as hold can. In fact, and I 
don’t speak jokingly, so furious and 
boisterous, numerous and continuous 
are the squabbles which take place 
for a comfortable bed that from an 
heur before sundown, till black dark, 
it is exceedingly difficult to carry on 
a conversation anywhere in the plaza. 
The trees are simply alive with 
squawking, flapping birds. Indeed the 
trees seem to have borne a crop of 
wings amidst their other foliage. Awn- 
ings are always put up evenings when 
the band plays to protect the seats. 
and heads of the listeners. 
Nor are the blackbirds the only 
guests, welcome or unwelcome, who 
make their beds and sleep undisturbed 
by cops or night watchmen, on the 
streets of the main thoroughfare of 
the city. Cotimely with the arrival of 
the blackbirds there ascend flocks and 
clouds of graceful, swift darting swal- 
lows, not chimney skifts, of course, 
because there are no chimneys in 
Mexico. They skim the heavens in 
early dusk in silence, apparently very 
deeply mortified at the dreadful squab- 
ble going on beneath them. Gradually 
as the evening’s dusk descends they 
too sink lower and lower and pass 
swifter and closer until the heavens 
look like an inverted magnified ant 
hill. Lower and lower they swoop, in 
gradually lessening circles until their 
twitterings can be caught mingled 
with the now somewhat subdued clam- 
or of the blackbirds. And finally after 
a few daring sweeps directly over the 
heads, even amongst the surging of the 
crowds below, they pass to their roost 
for the night, where however there 
has already begun a scramble for a 
“location” which bids fair to vie with 
the one described above. Their de- 
mands however are far less exacting 
than those of the blackbirds. No soft 
fresh green branch do they beseech. 
their only cry, and one which has now 
raised the total humdrum to its loud- 
est pitch—is for nothing more than 
one inch of bare, hard, cold copper 
wire. Only it must be an inch of a 
