28 



THE OOLOGIST 



was maybe a hundred nests of both 

 kind. The boys kept shooting the 

 birds and breaking the eggs until they 

 entirely broke it up and I thought I 

 had seen the last of the herons in this 

 locality, because mainly the scarcity of 

 suitable nesting sites; so, if you 

 please, imagine my agreeable surprise 

 when on Christmas Day, 1915, I dis- 

 covered a new herony in a piece of 

 virgin timber, containing about thirty 

 nests, all in good condition and appar- 

 ently of the Black Crowned variety. 

 George W. H. vosBurgli, 



A Young Red-Tail. 

 Madam Red-tail (Buteo borealis) 

 certainly expressed wisdom when she 

 selected the main flock of a giant ash 

 as a nesting site and would have re- 

 mained in undisturbed possession had 

 she displayed an equal sagacity in va- 

 cating at our approach but she calmly 

 sat upon her lofty domicile regardless 

 of the noise made by application of 

 irons and clubs to the tree trunk ac- 

 companied by a song and dance. It 

 was no unconquerable craving to as- 

 cend tall trees that inspired me to 

 climb but a curiosity to ascertain how 

 near the nest could be approached 

 before madam would leave. The al- 

 most imperceptible sound of the 

 climbers alarmed her more than all 

 previous demonstration and scarcely 

 ten of the seventy-five feet of limbless 

 tree trunk was covered when she glid- 

 ed silently away. I was inclined to 

 call the climb off but my companion 

 failed to see the matter in that light. 

 He was anxious to learn what the nest 

 contained and had no serious personal 

 objection to sitting in the shade ana 

 allowing me to ascend and find out. 

 As he was not addicted to the climb- 

 ing habit his mind conceived no great- 

 er labor in the ascension of a large 

 tree than riding on a street car, but 

 why weary the reader with detail. In 



brief, the nest contained two hand- 

 some juveniles clothed in grayish 

 white down with flesh colored legs, 

 black beaks, yellowish green ceres and 

 eyes with dark brown iris and dark 

 blue pupils and one of these young- 

 sters was abducted and the date was 

 May 3d, 1903. 



On May 6th, I took the following 

 data: Spread of wings from fleshy 

 tips, not end of down, 12 inches and 

 weight one pound. One week later to 

 an house the above was repeated with 

 the following result. Spread 18% 

 inches; weight 1% pounds. 



It was my intentions to repeat this 

 each week and also note further de- 

 velopment, but the captive was so un- 

 kind as to tumble from a second story 

 window and now, above his lovely 

 grave behind the woodshed, the in- 

 questive citijien may read these pa- 

 thetic lines: 



Window high 



Near sky 



Heard shout 



Rubbered out 



Big drop 



No step 



Stone walk 



Dead Hawk. 



J. Claire Wood. 

 Detroit, Mich. 



J. Hoopes Mattack. 



Death has called another Pennsyl- 

 vania Oologist, in J. Hoopes Mattack, 

 who died January 1st, 1916. Mr. Mat- 

 tack was born near West Chester, Sep- 

 tember 28, 1832. During the period uf 

 his greatest activity from 1870 to 1885 

 he was an ardent collector and suc- 

 ceeded in getting together a very cred- 

 itable collection of our local species, 

 together with others acquired by ex- 

 chaip^e. 



His collection did not boast of any 

 very rare species, but he collected 

 quite a good many that at the time 



