AND AMERICAN RURAL SPORTS. 



137 



spectability, who have resided in the islands of Jamaica, 

 Cuba, and the Bahamas and Bermudas, that this very bird 

 is common there in winter. We also find, from the works 

 of Hernandes Piso and others, that it is well known in 

 Mexico, Guiana, and Brazil; and if so, the place of its win- 

 ter retreat is easily ascertained, without having recourse to 

 all the trumpery of holes and caverns, torpidity, hyberna- 

 tion, and such ridiculous improbabilities. 



Nothing is more common in Pennsylvania than to see 

 large flocks of these birds in spring and fall, passing, at con- 

 siderable heights in the air; from the south in the former, 

 and from the north in the latter season. I have seen, in the 

 month of October, about an hour after sun-rise, ten or fif- 

 teen of them descend from a great height and settle on the 

 top of a tall detached tree, appearing, from their silence 

 and sedateness, to be strangers, and fatigued. After a pause 

 of a few minutes they began to dress and arrange their plu- 

 mage, and continued so employed for ten or fifteen minutes 

 more; then, on a few warning notes being given, perhaps 

 by the leader of the party, the whole remounted to a vast 



height, steering in a direct line for the south-west. In pass- 

 ing along the chain of the Bahamas towards the West In- 

 dies, no great difficulty can occur from the frequency of 

 these islands; nor even to the Bermudas, which are said to 

 be 600 miles from the nearest part of the continent. This 

 may seem an extraordinary flight for so small a bird; but it 

 is nevertheless a fact that it is performed. If we suppose 

 the Blue-bird in this case to fly only at the rate of a mile 

 per minute, which is less than I have actually ascertained 

 him to do over land, ten or eleven hours would be sufficient 

 to accomplish the journey; besides the chances he would 

 have of resting places by the way, from the number of ves- 

 sels that generally navigate those seas. In like manner two 

 days at most, allowing for numerous stages for rest, would 

 conduct him from the remotest regions of Mexico to any 

 part of the Atlantic States. When the natural historyofthat 

 part of the continent and its adjacent isles are better known, 

 and the periods at which its birds of passage arrive and de- 

 part, are truly ascertained, I have no doubt but these sup- 

 positions will be fully corroborated. 



ENCOUNTER WITH A PANTHER. 



There is no subject on which the mind dwells with so 

 much interest and intensity of thought, as the retrospect 

 of past life — to call to remembrance the scenes of early 

 youth — that period of existence which was spent in scenes 

 of gaiety and pleasure — exploits, replete with danger — ex- 

 cursions pregnant with difficulties and hairbreadth escapes 



r.i m 



— these fill the mind with a train of thought inexpressibly 

 interesting; and they become tenfold more delightful by 

 the lapse of riper years. To the mind of him whose youth- 

 ful days have been passed in the lonely wilds of a newly 

 settled country, where every day's experience gave rise to 

 some new event; and ingenuity and prowess were often 

 necessarily placed in com2:)etition with the ferocit}' of savage 

 animals, it is a source of contemplation, embodying in itself 



