YELLOW-EREASTED CHAT. 61 
you, it differs from most other birds with which I am acquainted, and 
has considerable claims to originality of character. It arrives in 
Pennsylvania about the first week in 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 circumstance 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 un- 
couth monosyllables, which it is difficult 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 is heard a repetition of short notes, 
resembling the whistling of the wings of a Duck or Teal, beginning 
loud and rapid, and falling lower and slower, till they end in detached 
notes ; then a succession of others, something like the barking of 
young puppies, is followed by a variety of hollow, guttural sounds, 
each eight or ten times repeated, more like those proceeding from the 
throat of a quadruped than that of a bird; which are succeeded by 
others not unlike the mewing of a cat, but considerably hoarser. All 
these are uttered with great vehemence, in such different keys, and 
with such peculiar modulations of voice, as sometimes to seem at a 
considerable distance, and instantly as if just beside you; now on 
this hand, now on that; so that, from these mancuvres of ventrilo- 
quism, you are utterly at a Joss to ascertain from what particular spot 
or quarter they proceed. If the weather be mild and serene, with 
clear moonlight, he continues gabbling in the same strange dialect, 
with very little intermission, during the whole night, as if disputing 
with his own echoes; but probably with a design of inviting the 
passing females to his retreat; for, when the season is further ad- 
vanced, they are seldom heard during the night. 
About the middle of May they begin to build. Their nest is 
usually fixed in the upper part of a bramble bush, in an almost im- 
penetrable thicket ; sometimes in a thick vine or small cedar; seldom 
more than four or five feet from the ground. It is composed out- 
2 
* 
markable, that Wilson should have introduced this genus in his Ornithology. The 
bird he placed in it has certainly no relation to the Manaking, nor has any one of 
that genus been found within the United States. + This bird has been placed by 
authors in half a dozen different genera. It was arranged in Muscicapa, by Gmelin, 
Latham, and Pennant; in Jurdus, by Brisson and Buffon; in Ampelis, by Sparr- 
man; and in Tanagra, by Desmarest. I svas at first inclined to consider it as a 
Vireo ; but, after having dwelt more upon the characters and habits of this remark- 
able species, I have concluded to adopt Icteria as an independent genus, agreeably 
to Vieillot.””— Ep. 
