SONGLESS BIRDS. Kingbird 



Look at him as he sits motionless on the top wire of the 

 fence, resting from an aerial excursion. He is easy to iden- 

 tify, for his grays and blacks are so distinct and the clear 

 white tail band is decisive. Suddenly he dashes into the 

 air or sweeps above the ground and secures an insect with 

 a sharp snap of the beak, — a drone bee, perhaps, although 

 the bees that he captures are comparatively few, — and re- 

 turns to the precise spot from which he started. This is a 

 habit peculiar to the Flycatchers. I once watched a King- 

 bird for nearly two hours, his point of vantage being a rail 

 and wire fence between low meadows, and, though he would 

 sail many hundred yards away, he always returned to his 

 original perch. If a Crow or Hawk appears ever so far in the 

 distance, he gives his shrill alarm note and goes in instaDt 

 pursuit ; and lucky is the chicken yard that has a pair of these 

 gallant knights at hand and the garden that shelters them. 



He does not seem, however, to care to cross swords with 

 the Catbird, not, perhaps, that he is absolutely afraid, but 

 he becomes suddenly near-sighted when that cunning musi- 

 cian crosses his path. Dr. Abbott once tested the valour 

 of a particularly saucy Kingbird, by sending up a red and 

 yellow bird kite in the vicinity of its nest, pulling the kite 

 backward as the bird advanced and then when he was close 

 upon it slackening the string so that the Kingbird, unable 

 to check itself, plunged through the paper and bolted off, 

 not returning for many hours, doubtless because his enemy 

 was intangible, and not from fear. 



Kingbirds make most devoted parents, and the young 

 birds are delightful little things to watch as they develop 

 if you are as fortunate in finding a nestful as was Mrs. 

 Olive Thorne Miller, who has recorded their ways for all 

 bird-lovers present and future in her " Chronicle of Three 

 Little Kings." l 



Opinions differ as to the Kingbird's bee-destroying pro- 

 clivities, for which he received the name of Bee Martin; 

 neighbouring farmers even tell different stories, — one hav- 

 ing assured me that last year his hives were impoverished, 



1 " Little Brothers of the Air," p. 19. 

 183 



