468 LAND BIRDS 



slyly, so quietly do these demure brown ladies slip into 

 the gay company that, but for the curious antics of their 

 ardent swains, you might not notice their advent. The 

 little cavalier can no longer contain his delight. From 

 a branch where he has been sitting, one will shoot sud- 

 denly straight upward, like a fiery spark against the 

 evening sky. There, high in the air, he poises on vibrat- 

 ing wing, with every feather fluffed out, crest raised, 

 and tail quirked up over his back, all the time pouring 

 out his joy in bubbling music. Just as you are sure he 

 will explode with the rapture of it, down he comes, 

 lightly as an autumn leaf. It is his wooing, and 

 somewhere among the green leaves his sweetheart is 

 watching. 



One such aerial serenade had quite an unlooked-for 

 ending. Evidently the performer had chosen his arena 

 without properly surveying the neighborhood ; for, as he 

 hovered in the air only four feet away from an oak tree 

 limb where sat an Arkansas kingbird, the latter, con- 

 ceiving this to be a direct challenge and ever ready for 

 a scrap, darted out at him with indescribable fury. 

 The result was a kaleidoscopic mingling of yellow, red, 

 and brown tumbling earthward, the birds fighting as 

 they fell. The Vermilion had been taken by surprise, 

 and was no match for his antagonist, but he fought 

 gallantly. As he landed on his back on the ground, 

 with feet and bill still eager to finish, the kingbird rose 

 a few feet above him, poised over him as a hawk over 

 a field mouse lair, hesitated, and for some occult reason 

 flew back to his own perch. His honor had been vin- 



