APPENDIX. 191 
Yellow-breasted Chat. 
“As soon as our bird has chosen his retreat, which is commonly in 
some thorny or viny thicket, where he can obtain concealment, he be- 
comes jealous of his assumed rights, and resents the least intrusion, 
scolding all who approach in a variety of odd and uncouth tones, very 
difficult to describe or imitate, except by a whistling, in which case the 
bird may be made to approach, but seldom within sight. His responses 
on such occasions are constant and rapid, expressive of anger and anxiety ; 
and still unseen, his voice shifts from place to place amidst the thicket, 
like the haunting of a fairy. Some of these notes resemble the whistling 
of the wings of a flying duck, at first loud and rapid, then sinking till they 
seem to end in single notes. A succession of other tones are now heard, 
some like the barking of young puppies, with a variety of hollow, guttural, 
uncommon sounds, frequently repeated, and terminated occasionally by 
something like the mewing of a cat, but hoarser, — a tone to which all our 
vireos, particularly the young, have frequent recurrence. All these notes 
are uttered with vehemence, and with such strange and various modula- 
tions as to appear near or distant, like the mancuvres of ventriloquism.1 
In mild weather also, when the moon shines, this gabbling, with exuber- 
ance of life and emotion, is heard nearly throughout the night, as if the 
performer were disputing with the echoes of his own voice.” — Nuttall, T.: 
Manual of Ornithology, p. 340. 
Bobolink. (See p. 82.) 
“Have tried on the bobolink. Found him, as I antici- 
pated, impossible to copy fully, but I can make out his 
pitch,? and some of his notes. One must be very quick 
to decide on the intervals in a bird-song; I have much 
improved in it, and I was tolerably apt when I took ’em 
1 See Index, Ventriloquism. 
2 Mr. Cheney took the pitch with a little reed instrument made for 
the purpose. It is about five inches long and two inches wide. The 
tones are, — 
re 
Te 
