CHAPTER XII 

 THE FLYCATCHERS 



Kingbird — Crested Flycatcher — Phoebe — Wood Pe- 

 WEE — ^Least Flycatcher 



A dusky bird, smaller than the robin, lighter gray under- 

 neath than on its sooty-brown back, with a well-rounded, 

 erect head, set on a short, thick neck, one may safely guess 

 is one of the flycatchers — another strictly American family. 

 If the bird has a white band across the end of its tail it is 

 probably the fearless kingbird. If the feathers on top of its 

 head look as if they had been brushed the wrong way into a 

 pointed crest; moreover, if some chestnut color shows in its 

 tail when spread, and its pearly gray breast shades into 

 yellow underneath, you are looking at the noisy "wild 

 Irishman" of birddom, the crested flycatcher. Confiding 

 Phoebe wears the plainest of dull clothes with a still darker, 

 dusky crown cap, and a line of white on her outer tail 

 feathers. She and the plaintive wood pewee, who has two 

 indistinct whitish bars across her extra-long wings, are 

 scarcely larger than an English sparrow; while the least 

 flycatcher, who calls himself Chebec, is, as you may sup- 

 pose, the smallest member of the tribe to leave the tropics 

 and spend the summer with us. Male anid female mem- 

 bers of this family wear similar clothes, fortunately for the 

 novice who tries to name them. 



13S 



