ARGENTINE BIRDS 33 



bientevido, which is brown above, yellow beneath, with 

 a boldly marked black and white head, and a yellow 

 crest. It is very nbisy, is common in the neighbourhood 

 of houses, and builds a big domed nest. It is really a 

 big, heavy king-bird, fiercer and more powerful than 

 any northern king-bird. I saw them assail not only the 

 big but the small hawks with fearlessness, driving them 

 in headlong flight. They not only capture insects, but 

 pounce on mice, small frogs, lizards, and httle snakes, 

 rob birds'-nests of the fledgling young, and catch tadpoles 

 and even small fish. 



Two of the tyrants which I observed are like two 

 with which I grew fairly familiar in Texas. • The scissor- 

 taU is common throughout the open country, and the 

 long tail feathers, which seem at times to hamper its 

 flight, attract attention whether the bird is in flight or 

 perched on a tree. It has a habit of occasionally soaring 

 into the air and descending in loops and spirals. The 

 scarlet tyrant I saw in the orchards and gardens. The 

 male is a fascinating little .bird, coal-black above, while 

 his crested head and the body beneath are brilliant scarlet. 

 He utters his rapid, low- voiced musical trill in the air, 

 rising with fluttering wings to a height of a hundred 

 feet, hovering while he sings, and then falling back to 

 earth. The colour of the bird and the character of his 

 performance attract the attention of every observer — 

 bird, beast, or man — within reach of vision. 



The red-backed tyrant is utterly unlike any of his 



kind in the United States, and until I looked him up 



in Sclater and Hudson's ornithology I never dreamed 



that he belonged to this family. He— for only the male 



is so brightly coloured — is coal-black with a dull red 



back. I saw these birds on December 1 near Barilloche, 



out on the bare Patagonian plains. They behaved like 



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