AMERICAN DIPPER. 
Cinclus mexicanus SWAINS. 
EN THE mountainous districts of western North America, where the mountain torrents 
rush headlong, foaming and thundering, over the rocks, where roaring water-falls 
bound through the narrow cajfions, lives, year in year out, the AMERICAN DIPPER, or 
WATER OUZEL, a bird of most romantic inclinations. It ranges from the Yukon Valley, 
in Alaska, south to Guatemala. Its haunts are always the clear cool mountain streams 
and the water-falls, always in the most beautifully romantic places, usually where the 
water’s edge is overhung in some places by cedars, in others by the dense pines, firs 
or spruces of those regions; but always where the rushing and gurgling of the water 
mingles with its loud song. Pure, clear water, running over the stony, pebbly, or rocky 
bed, is one of the necessary conditions of its existence, and on this account it avoids all 
turbid waters and likewise the rivers and rivulets of the plains, and is not to be found 
on the shores of the mountain lakes. It enlivens with its presence only the clear wild 
streams, and of these it is as much a part as the cliffs, the mossy stones, the cascades, 
eddies, and swift currents. In such localities our bird is a permanent resident, rarely 
or never leaving its native haunts, but, at most, merely shifting up or down the torrent 
with the changing of the season, without ever going quite down into the plains. 
The bird is usually seen on some moss-covered stone or on some larger rock pro- 
truding from the water. It will also sele¢ét, as a standing ground, dead branches and 
drift-logs from which to sally out in search of water-insects. It lives either singly or in 
pairs, more than two never occurring in one place. Here these birds exhibit all day long 
a most persistent activity, occasionally flying through the foaming water as it bounds 
from the rocks, and skipping over the stones or walking farther and farther into the 
water till it closes over them. Apparently almost as much at home under the water as 
on the dry land, it will dive some distance beneath the surface to remain for a minute 
or more. 
He who has watched the manceuvres of the Water Ouzel in some torrent, must 
certainly have felt conscious of some slight feeling of envy. For he must have seen that 
the nimble fellow delights to tarry where the water foams and gurgles most and where 
the cataracts thunder and splash. There he will sit for minutes together on some damp 
stone overgrown with dark green moss; suddenly he will see something, and at once 
sallies into the water. At first he wades along, but the depth of the stream keeps in- 
creasing, rising to his neck and head. But what of that? The water may close over 
him—he cares not at all! He runs on under the surface with just as little concern as 
on the firm ground of the shore; he flies through the wildest catarac&t, cheerfully dives 
into the depth:—and when he comes out into the daylight, the water rolls off from his 
feathers like glittering pearls. He is at home on the ground, familiar with the water, 
and no stranger to the air; he calls three elements his own—he controls, he com- 
mands them. 
