1 56 BY- WA YS AND BIRD-NO TES. 



leafless trees. It is a good nest-builder, and 

 provides for its young with a great show of 

 affection and industry It customarily keeps 

 near the ground, but I have observed large 

 flocks high up in the air, migrating southward 

 in autumn. 



Turning from a provokingly dual subject — 

 the paradoxical nature of our jay — one feels 

 relieved in speaking of the genial and melodi- 

 ous life of the brown-thrush. Next to the 

 mocking-bird the most famous singer of our 

 woods, this beautiful little fellow, with his 

 snuff-colored coat and dappled vest, is welcome 

 wherever he goes. My observations of his 

 habits extend over a wide area reaching from 

 Northern Indiana to Florida, and I have no 

 vicious trait of his character to record. In 

 the mountains of East Tennessee, and among 

 the hills of North Carolina and Georgia, 

 brown-thrushes are almost as common as are 

 blackbirds in the flat fields of Illinois. The 

 thickets that rim the glades, especially the wild 

 orchards of haw and crab-apple, plum' and 

 honey-locust, are the favorite nesting-places 

 of this bird ; but he chooses the topmost tuft 

 of the tallest tree for his perch while singing. 

 His song, full-toned, loud, clear, varied, is 

 often mistaken by casual listeners for that of 

 the mocking-bird, though really far inferior to 

 it in both volume and compass, and scarcely 

 to be compared with it in purity of resonance. 

 In the far South, where all birds are given to 

 greater latitude of habit than in the North, the 

 brown-thrush now and then sings in the night, 

 a low, dreamy, lulling song, warbled as if with 

 a sleepy throat. In this' too he follows, but 

 does not equal, the mocking-bird. I have 



