ICTEBIB^ — AGELMIN^ : MABSH BLACKBIRDS. 



401 



edged with yellowisli ; bill blackish-horn ; feet brown. The faultless fuU dress of black, white, 

 and buff is worn only for a brief period ; and even in spring and summer, most males are found 

 to have yellowish touches in the black, especially of the under parts. The "delirious song" 

 is only heard while the males are trooping their way to their breeding-grounds, and before the 

 midsummer change of feather. $ in fall, ? , and young, entirely different in color : Yellowish- 

 brown above, brownish-yeUow below ; crown and back conspicuously, nape, rump, and sides 

 less broadly, streaked with black ; crown with a median and lateral light stripe ; wings and 

 taU blackish, pale-edged ; bill brown, paler below. In this, the ordinary condition, the <? is 

 only known by superior size. Fall birds are more buffy than the spring ? . The $ changing 

 shows confused characters of both sexes (see p. 89) ; but in any plumage the species may be 

 recognized by the stifflsh, extremely acute taU-feathers, in connection with its special dimensions. 

 $: Length 7.00-7.50; extent 11.50-12.25; wing 3.50-3.80; tail 2.75-3.00; tarsus 1.00; 

 middle toe and claw 1.25. ? • Length 6.50-7.00 ; extent 10.50-11.25 ; wing 3.25-3.50, etc., 

 averaging i an inch less in length and an inch in extent. Chiefly Eastern U. S. and Canada ; 

 N. to 54° in the region of the Saskatchewan, W. not ordinarily beyond the central plains, bat 

 occurs in Montana, Idaho, Utah, and Nevada. Winters wholly extrahmital. In May, the 

 vivacious, voluble, and eccentric " Bobo- 

 links " pass North, spreading over the 

 meadows of the Middle and Northern 

 States from the Atlantic to Kansas and 

 Dakota, perfecting its black dress, and 

 breeding in June and July. After the 

 midsummer change the "Reed-bird" or 

 "Rice-bird" comes "back, thronging the 

 marshes in immense flocks with the Black- 

 bii'ds ; has simply a chirping note, feeds on 

 the wild oats and wild rice, and becomes 

 extremely fat and is accounted a great 

 delicacy. The name "ortolan," applied 

 by some gunners and restaurateurs to this 

 bird, as well as to the Carolina Rail {Por- 

 zana Carolina) is in either case a strange 



reduced. 



(Sheppard del. 



Nichols sc.) 



misnomer, the Ortolan being a fringiUine bird of Europe, Emheriza hortulana L. (Lat. hortu- 

 lanus, relating to a garden.) In the West Indies, where this bird retires in winter, as it does 

 also to Central and South America, it is called "butter-bird." The names "bobolink" and 

 " meadow- wink " are in imitation of its cry; "skunk blackbird" notes the resemblance in 

 color to the obnoxious quadruped. The migrations are performed mostly at night, when in 

 May and early September one may hear the mellow metallic " chink" of the invisible passen- 

 gers. Nest on the ground, artfully concealed in the grass; eggs 4-6, 0.90X0.65, stone-gray, 

 dotted, mottled, and clouded with dark browns. 

 99. MOLO'THRUS. (Gr. fioXo^pot, or juoXo/3pos, vagabond, tramp, parasite. ) Cowbirds. BUI 

 short, stout, conic and fiingilline, about f as long as head ; but entirely unnotched and 

 unbristled, with little bent of commissure, the broad culmen running well up on the forehead, 

 the nostrils well in advance of the feathers. Wings long and pointed, the first 3 primaries 

 entering into the tip, rest rapidly graduated. Tail shorter than wings, nearly even or a little 

 rounded, tending to divaricate in the middle, the feathers broad and plane to their rounded ends. 

 Feet strong ; tarsus not shorter than middle toe. <J black and lustrous, without red or yellow ; 

 9 plain black or brown. Terrestrial, but not specially palustrine ; eminently gregarious and 

 polygamous, or rather communistic, never mating or building nests ; thus parasitic, like the Old 

 World cuckoos; no musical ability. To the single species long notorious in the U. S., a second 



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