PIELD SPARROW. 121 



are unique, reminding more of the sounds of an insect than a bird, and are easily 

 recognized. 



NAMES: Chipping Sparrow, Chipping-bird, Chippy, Chip-bird, Hair-bird, Chipper. — Haarfink, Haarvogel 

 (German), 



SCIENTIFIC NAMES: FringiUa socialls Wils. (1810). SPIZELLA SOCIALIS Bonap. (1838). Emberiza 

 socia/fs Aud. (1839). Sp/nites socia//s Cab. (1851). Spizella domestica Cones {1882). 



DESCRIPTION: "Rump, back of neck, and sides of head and neck, ashy. Interscapular region with black 

 streaks, margined with pale rufous. Crown continuous and uniform chestnut. Forehead, black, 

 separated in the middle by white. A white streak over the eye to the nape, and a black one from the 

 base of the bill through and behind the eye. Lores, dusky. Upper parts, unspotted whitish, tinged 

 with ashy on the sides and across the upper breast. Tail-feathers and primaries, edged with paler, 

 not white. Two narrow white bands across the wing-coverts. Bill, black. 

 '■Length, 5.75 inches; wing nearly 3.00; tail, 2.50 (or less)." (Ridgway.) 



The Western Chipping Sparrow, S. socialis arizonae Coues, a local variety of the 

 foregoing, inhabits the Western United States, from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific. 

 Winters in middle and western Mexico. 



FIELD SPARROW, 



Spizellsi pusilla Bonapartk. 



Plate XXIII. Pig. 4. 



There's something in the a,ir 

 That's new and sweet and rare,- 

 A scent of summer things, 

 A -whirr as if of -wings. 



There's something, too. that's new 

 In the color of the hlne 

 That's in the morning sky 

 Before the s«n is high. 



Nora Perry. 



^HE HIGHLANDS of south-western Missouri and northern Arkansas are blessed 

 w^ith a most congenial climate throughout the year. Though changeable, the 

 winters are short and not very cold, and the somewhat dry summers are not oppress- 

 ively hot. A very invigorating mountain air, blowing always from the South, makes 

 even the hottest days pleasant. The plateaus of this locality — the Ozark region — are 

 mostly prairies surrounded by w^oods. Hill-sides and valleys, and the many ravines are 

 clothed with a dense growth of forest trees and underwood. These woodlands are not 

 so beautifully romantic as are those of the Northern States or New England, nor do they 

 have the charm of the magnolia and live-oak woods near the Gulf coast, destitute as they 

 are of a great variety of species. Swamps and large sheets of water are entirely absent. 

 The ravines are usually covered with trees and thickets of hazel, white-thorn, sumach, 

 snowberry*, nine-bark^, sweet viburnum'*, black haw', arrow-wood", persimmons, 

 wahoo^, and others. Wild grape-vines, poison sumach', trumpet creeper', and smilax 

 convert many thickets into impenetrable masses of tangled green. In the Northern States 

 May is generally a very cold, changeable, and unreliable month, but here the climate 

 reaches at this time the climax of beauty. The air is exceedingly mild and invigorating, 

 the ground is covered with masses of flowers, and the air is full of bird song. The 



t Sympboricarpas glomeratas. 2 Spirxa opulifolia. 3 Viburnum leniago. -i Viburnum pranifolium. 5 viburnum 

 dentatum. e Euonymus atropurpureus. 7 Khus toxicodendron. « Tecoma radicans. 



