of the ^^ Birds of AinericaJ^ 17 



may be new to your readers, I take the liberty of sending 

 you the following extract from the letters of Col. Abert 

 published in the Monthly American Journal of Geology 

 and Natural Science, Nov. 1831, page 221. 



" I have been informed that some of our learned city 

 gentlemen have doubted the truth of his (Audubon's) 

 representation of the rattle snake attacking a mocking 

 bird's nest (^Tardus polygloitus, Linn.) from an opinion 

 that the rattle snake does not climb ; an opinion by the 

 way, more common in our cities, than with the hunters In 

 the wilds in which this reptile is generally found. But as 

 I am possessed of some facts on this subject, which prove 

 that the rattle snake does climb, I will in justice to IMr. 

 Audubon relate them to you." 



" 1st. When Lieut. Swift of our army was engaged on 

 the survey in Florida in 1826, his attention was suddenly 

 called to a group of his men within about one hundred 

 feet from where he stood. They had just killed a snake, 

 w^hich the men assured him they had seen seize a grey 

 squirrel on the limb of a tree, about fifteen feet from tlie 

 ground and fall to the earth with it. When Lieut. Swift 

 had arrived at the place, the snake was already dead and 

 much mangled. He did not examine it for the rattles, 

 but his Florida hunters, who are as familiar with the ap- 

 pearance of the rattle snake as we are with that of the 

 chicken, told him that it was a rattle snake. 



j> 



" 2d. General Jessup, the Quarter Master General of 

 our army, assured me in conversation a day or two since, 

 that he had seen the rattle snake upon bushes, and par- 

 ticularly stated one case in which he had seen a snake of 

 that kind up a Paupau tree {PorceJia triloba j Pursh). He 

 added that in one of his excursions in the woods of the 

 West he had actually witnessed a scene similar to that of 

 Mr. Audubon, of birds defending their nests against a snake- 



VOL. I. PART I. 3 



