BLUE-BIRD. 39 
other fruits and seeds which I have found in their stomachs at that 
season, which, being no botanist, [ am unable to particularize. They 
are frequently pestered with a species of tape worm, some of which I 
have taken from their intestines of an extraordinary size, and, in some _ , 
cases, in great numbers. Most other birds are also plagued with these - 
vermin ; but the Blue-Bird seems more subject to them than any I 
know, except the Woodcock. An account of the different species of 
vermin, many of which, I doubt not, are nondescripts, that infest the 
plumage and intestines of our birds, would of itself form an interestin, 
publication ; but, as this belongs more properly to the entomologist, 
shall only, in the course of this work, take notice of some of the most 
remarkable. i : 
The usual spring and summer song of the Blue-Bird is a soft, 
agreeable, and oft-repeated warble, uttered with open, quivering wings, 
and is extremely pleasing. In his motions and general character, he 
has great resemblance to the Robin Redbreast of Britain; and, had 
he the brown olive of that bird, instead of his own blue, could scarcely 
be distinguished from him. Like him, he is known to almost every 
child; and shows as much confidence in man by associating with him 
in summer, as the other by his familiarity in winter. He is also of a 
mild and peaceful disposition, seldom fighting or quarreling with other 
birds. His society is courted by the inhabitants of the country, and 
few farmers neglect to provide for him, in some suitable place, a snug 
little summer-house, ready fitted and rent free. For this he more than 
sufficiently repays them by the cheerfulness of his song, and the mul- 
titude of injurious insects which he daily destroys. Towards fall, that 
is, in the month of October, hig song changes to asingle plaintive note, 
as he passes over the yellow many-colored woods ; and its melancholy 
air recalls to our minds the approaching decay of the face of nature. 
Even after the trees are stripped of their leaves, he still lingers over his 
native fields, as if loath to leave them. About the middle or end of 
November, few or none of them are seen; but, with every return of 
mild and open weather, we hear his plaintive note amidst the fields, 
or in the air, seeming to deplore the devastations of winter. Indeed, 
he appears scarcely ever totally to forsake us; but to follow fair 
weather through all its journeyings till the return of spring. 
Such are the mild and pleasing manners of the Blue-Bird, and so 
universally is he esteemed, that I have often regretted that no pastoral 
muse has yet arisen in this western, woody world, to do justice to his 
name, and endear him to us still more by the tenderness of verse, as 
has been done to his representative in Britain, the Robin Redbreast. 
A small acknowledgment of this kind I have to offer, which the reader, 
T hope, will excuse as a tribute to rural innocence. 
When winter’s cold tempests and snows are no more, 
Green meadows and brown furrow’d fields reappearing, 
The fishermen hauling their shad to the shore, 
And cloud-cleaving Geese to the lakes are a-steering ; 
When first the lone butterfly flits on the wing, 
When red glow the maples, so fresh and so pleasing, - 
O then comes the Blue-Bird, the herald of spring ! 
Ard hails with his warblings the charms of the season 
