BIRDS OF THE UNITED STATES. 
181 
Plate XXXI. 
SIALIA SIALIS, (Linn.) Haldem. 
Eastern Bluebird. 
Inhabiting the vast continents lying to the eastward of our own, 
exists a family of birds popularly known as Stone-chats. Though mainly 
denizens of the Old World, yet they are not without their representatives 
in the New. To this group belongs the genus Sialia, notwithstanding the 
possession of structural peculiarities which ally it to the Thrushes. Of aves 
claiming such affinity, none is better known than the above species. 
Throughout the eastern faunal area of North America, from Georgia 
and Louisiana to the 48th parallel of north latitude, and westward to the 
highlands of the Mississippi, our genial, sky-blue friend abounds, in vary- 
ing numbers, and rears its triple brood. Along the Atlantic seaboard, it 
never ventures as far north as it does in the interior, being rarely observed 
beyond the Penobscot River, although Verrill met with it in abundance in 
Western Maine. Six hundred miles out at sea, in the delightful climate 
of the Bermudas, it finds a permanent residence, and is also to be seen in 
Spanish Cuba, hut only on rare occasions. Among the lofty ridges and 
open table-lands of the Rockies, it never occurs, but gives place to an 
apparently hardier species, the Arctic Bluebird of naturalists ; wdiile west 
of this vast mountain barrier, another form prevails. 
So strongly attached to the natal spot do these birds become, that it 
is with profound feelings of regret that they leave it. It is only wffien 
the rigors and snows of our northern winters have denied them a living, 
and thus rendered a longer sojourn impossible, that they take their de- 
parture for the South. Here they while away the dreary hours as best 
