WHERE BIRDS ROOST. 125 



even slept on the under side of an oblique branch. 

 One of them passed one night on a horizontal perch, 

 although apparently his slumbers were not quite so 

 sound and refreshing as they would have been had 

 he roosted in the wonted upright position. Queerest 

 of all, these woodpeckers sometimes selected the 

 side of the cage itself for a roosting-place, thrusting 

 their claws into the crevice between the door and 

 its frame. Wherever they roosted, their tails were 

 made to do duty as braces, by being pressed tightly 

 against the wall to which they clung. A pair of 

 young red-headed woodpeckers behaved in much 

 the same way, always preferring to sleep on an 

 upright perch. 



During the spring of 1893 I placed in a cage the 

 following birds, all taken while in a half-callow state, 

 from the nest : Two cat-birds, one red-winged black- 

 bird, one cow-bunting, and two meadow-larks. In 

 a few days all of them proclaimed their species, as 

 well as the inexorable law of heredity, by selecting 

 such roosts as were best adapted to them, and that 

 without any instruction whatever from adult birds. 

 The meadow-larks almost invariably squatted on the 

 grass with which the floor of the cage was lined, 

 usually scratching and waddling from side to side 

 until they had made cosey hollows to fit their bodies ; 

 while the remaining inmates flew up to the perches 

 when bed-time came. 



It was quite interesting to look in upon my group 

 of sleeping pets of an evening, part of them roosting 

 in the lower story of the cage and the rest in the 



