A BUNCH OF BRIGHT BIRDS 269 



exceptions already noted. In size he ranks be- 

 tween the least flycatcher and the wood pewee. 

 In liveliness of action he is equal to the spryest 

 of his family, with a flirt of the tail which to my 

 eye is identical with that of the phoebe. His gor- 

 geous color is the more effective because of his 

 aerial habits. The tanager is bright sitting on 

 the bough, but how much brighter he would look 

 if every few minutes he were seen hovering in 

 mid-air with the sunlight playing upon him ! 



Certainly I was in great luck, and I felt it the 

 more as day after day I found the dashing beauty 

 in the same place. I could not spend my whole 

 winter vacation in visiting him, but I saw him 

 there at odd times, — nearly as often as I passed, 

 — until February 17. Then he disappeared ; but 

 a week later I discovered him, or another like 

 him, in a different part of the valley, and on the 

 26th I saw two. The next day, for the first time, 

 one of the birds was in voice, uttering a few fine, 

 short notes, little remarkable in themselves, but 

 thoroughly characteristic ; not suggestive of any 

 other flycatcher notes known to me ; so that, 

 from that time to the end of my stay in Tucson, 

 I was never in doubt as to their authorship, no 

 matter where I heard them. 



All these earlier birds were males in full 

 plimiage. The first female — herself a beauty, 



