SCARLET TANAGER 125 
eggs and progeny to the mercy and management of other smaller 
birds, in the same cage with a Red-Bird, which fed and reared it with 
reat tenderness. They both continue to inhabit the same cage, and 
have hopes that the Red-Bird will finish his pupil’s education by 
teaching him his song. 
I must here remark, for the information of foreigners, that the story 
told by Le Page du Pratz, in his History of Louisiana, and which has 
been so often’ repeated by other writers, that the Cardinal Grosbeak 
“collects together great hoards of maize and buck-wheat, often as 
much as a bushel, which it artfully covers with leaves and small twigs, 
leaving only a small hole for entrance into the magazine,” is entirely 
fabulous. 
This species is eight inches long, und eleven in extent; the whole 
upper parts are a dull, dusky red, except the sides of the neck and 
head, which, as well as the whole lower parts, are bright vermilion ; 
chin, front, and lures, black; the head is ornamented with a high, 
pointed crest, which it frequently erects in an almost perpendicular 
position, and can also flatten at pleasure, so as to be scarcely percep- 
tible; the tail extends three inches beyond the wings, and is nearly 
even at the end; the bill is of a brilliant coralline color, very thick 
and powerful, for breaking hard grain and seeds; the legs and feet, a 
light clay color, (not blood red, as Buffon describes them) iris of the 
eye, dark hazel. The female (Fig. 44) is less than the male, has the 
upper parts of a brownish olive, or drab color, the tail, wings, and tip 
of the crest excepted, which are nearly as red as those of the male; 
the lores, front, and chin, are light ash; breast, and lower parts, a 
reddish drab; bill, legs, and eyes, as those of the male; the crest is 
shorter, and less frequently raised. 
One peculiarity in the female of this species is, that she often sings 
nearly as well as the male. [ do not know whether it be owing to 
some little jealousy on this score or not, that the male, when both 
occupy the same cage, very often destroys the female. 
SCARLET TANAGER.— TANAGRA RUBRA.— Fries. 45, 46. 
Tanagra rubra, Lynn. Syst. i. p. 314, 3. —Cardinal de Canada, Briss. Orn. iii. p. 
48, pl. 2, fig. '5.— Lath. ii- 217, No. 3.— Scarlet Sparrow, Edw. pl. 343.— 
Canada Tanager en a Tanager, Arct. Zool. p. 369, No. a$7, 238. — 
Peale’s Museum, No. 6 
PYRANGA* RUBRA.—Swatinson. 
Pyranga eens Re Enc, Method. p. 793.— Tanagra rubra, Bonap. Synop. 
p. 105.— Pyranga rubra, North. Zool. ii. p, 273. : 
Tars is one of the gaudy foreigners (and perhaps the most showy) 
that regularly visit us -rom the torrid regions of the south. He is. 
* Pyranga has been established for the reception of this bird as the type, and a 
few others, ; all natives of the New World, and more particularly inhabiting the 
11* 
