130 RICE BUNTING. 
The winter residence of this species'I suppose to be from Mexico 
to the mouth of the Amazon, from whence, in hosts innumerable, they 
regularly issue every spring; perhaps to both hemispheres, extending 
their migrations northerly as far as the banks of the Illinois and the 
shores of the St. Lawrence. Could the fact be ascertained, which has 
been asserted by some writers, that the emigration of these birds was 
altogether unknown in this part of the continent, previous to the intro- 
duction of rice plantations, it would certainly be interesting. Yet, 
why should these migrations reach at least a thousand miles beyond 
those places where rice is now planted; and this, not in occasional 
excursions, but regularly to breed, and rear their young, where rice 
never was, and probably never will be, cultivated? Their so recent 
arrival on this part of the continent, I believe to be altogether imagi- 
nary, because, though there were not a single grain of rice cultivated 
within the United States, the country produces an exuberance of 
food of which they are no less fond. Insects of various kinds, grubs, 
May-flies, and caterpillars, the young ears of Indian corn, and the seed 
of the wild oats, or, as it is called in Pennsylvania, reeds, (the Zizania 
aquatica of Linneus,) which grows in prodigious abundance along the 
marshy shores of our large rivers, furnish, not only them, but millions 
of Rail, with a delicious subsistence for several weeks. I do not doubt, 
however, that the introduction of rice, but more particularly the 
progress of agriculture, in this part of America, has greatly increased 
their numbers, by multiplying their sources of subsistence fifty fold 
within the same extent of country, 
In the month of April, or very early in May, the Rice Bunting, male 
and female, in the dresses in which they appear in Figs. 47 and 48, 
arrive within the southern boundaries of the United States, and are 
seen around the town of Savannah in Georgia, about the 4th of May, 
sometimes in separate parties of males and females, but more generally 
promiscuously. They remain there but a short time; and, about the 
12th of May, make their appearance in the lower parts of Pennsyl- 
vania, as they did at Savannah. While here, the males are extremely 
gay and full of song; frequenting meadows, newly-ploughed fields, 
sides of creeks, rivers, and watery places, feeding on May-flies and 
caterpillars, of which they destroy great quantities. In their passage, 
however, through Virginia, at this season, they do great damage to the 
early wheat and barley, while in its milky state. About the 20th of 
May, they disappear, on their way to the north. Nearly at the same 
time, they arrive in the state of New York, spread over the whole New 
England States, as far as the River St. Lawrence, from Lake Ontario to 
the sea; in all of which places, north of Pennsylvania, they remain 
during the summery, building, and rearing their young. The nest is 
fixed in the ground, generally in a field of grass; the outside is com- 
posed of dry leaves and coarse grass, the inside is lined with fine 
stalks of the same, laid in considerable quantity. The female lays 
five eggs, of a bluish white, marked with numerous, irregular spots of 
blackish brown. The song of the male, while the female is sitting, is 
singular, and very agreeable. Mounting and hovering on wing, at a 
migrations eastward, they ff monly at night; whereas, in autumn, when they are 
returning southward, their flight is diurnal. — Ep. 
