210 YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT. 



rest of the wing dusky, finely edged with dark olive yellow ; throat and 

 whole breast riah yellow, spreading also along the sides under the wings, 

 handsomely marked with spots of black running in chains ; belly and 

 vent yellowish white ; tail forked, dusky black, edged with yellow olive, 

 the three exterior feathers on each side marked on their inner vanes 

 with a spot of white. The yellow on the throat and sides of the neck 

 reaches nearly round it, and is very bright. 



Genus XLIV. PIPKA. MANAKIN. 

 Species. PIPRA POLTGLOTTA. 



YELLOW-BREASTED CHAT. 



[Plate VI. Fig. 2.] 



Muscicapa viridis, Gmel. Syst. i., 936. — Le Merle vert de la Caroline, Buffon, hi., 

 Z^d.— Chattering Flycatcher, Arct. Zool. ii., No. 266.— Lath. Syn. iii., 350, A% 

 — Garrulus Australia, Baetram, 290.* 



This is a very singular bird. In its voice and manners^ and the habit 

 it has of keeping concealed, while shifting and vociferating around you, 

 it differs from most other birds with which I am acquainted ; and has 

 considerable claims to originality of character. It arrives in Pennsyl- 

 vania about the first week ip May, and returns to the south again as 

 soon as its young are able for the journey, which is usually about the 

 middle of August ; its term of residence here being scarcely four months. 

 The males generally arrive several days before the females, a circum- 

 stance common with many other of our birds of passage. 



When he has once taken up his residence in a favorite situation, 

 which is almost always in close thickets of hazel, brambles, vines, and 

 thick underwood, he becomes very jealous of his possessions, and seems 

 offended at the least intrusion ; scolding every passenger as soon as 

 they come within view, in a great variety of odd and uncouth mono- 

 syllables, which it is difiicult to describe, "but which may be readily 

 imitated so as to deceive the bird himself, and draw him after you for 

 half a quarter of a mile at a time, as I have sometimes amused myself 

 in doing, and frequently without once seeing him. On these occasions 

 his responses are constant and rapid, strongly expressive of anger and 

 anxiety ; and while the bird itself remains unseen, the voice shifts from 

 place to place, among the bushes, as if it proceeded from a spirit. 

 First are heard a repetition of short notes, resembling the whistling of 



* Ictera dumicola, Vieill. Ois. de VAm. Sept. pi. 55.' 



