BIRDS 



309 



ously pursuing a second brown-colored bird, apparently a female, be- 

 fore whom he presented himself in a drooping attitude with spread 

 wings. Several brown-plumaged males were shot which had the 

 testes enlarged. 



We visited Iguana Cove again during the first part of March. This 

 time numerous sets of eggs, all well advanced in incubation, and sev- 

 eral sets of young birds were found. Everywhere the males were 

 singing continuously. Their song was even more varied than before, 

 consisting in most cases of several syllables instead of two. One song 

 resembled tii wee' -ivSei-twee-ttvee . The ordinary tu'-wee song was 

 heard, but it was not nearly so common as in December, while the 

 songs with a greater number of syllables were much more common 

 than then. 



The same place was visited a third time early in June. The nest- 

 ing season was now past and the birds were much less abundant on the 

 flat to the east of Iguana Cove than during December and March, and 

 but few were heard singing. 



At Tagus Cove some fledglings were taken from the nest while 

 the parents were absent. Both of the latter, however, soon came 

 flying very excitedly about the place, keeping most of the time near 

 the ground, repeating in rapid succession a short, sharp, t-iveet-\\\.& 

 note. The young became very angry at being handled and uttered a 

 a sound resembling zee''u, zee"u, zee"u, etc. The long e-sound of the 

 first syllable was somewhat prolonged and given a deep vibratory 

 sound. Although the young birds were not yet able to fly, they 

 uttered the notes in very resentful tones and bit savagely at the fingers 

 of the person handling them. 



Birds were observed on the Seymour Islands and the neighboring 

 part of Indefatigable from April 26 to May 4. On South Seymour they 

 were much more abundant than on North Seymour or on the part of 

 Indefatigable visited. They were not nesting, but the males were 

 singing a great deal, and most of the songs they sang were very no- 

 ticeably different from the songs of the Albemarle birds. The song 

 that they uttered most commonly resembled teur'-lee-hee, teur'-Tee- 

 hee, teur'-lle-hee. The first syllable of each set carried the accent, 

 and the second and third syllables differed only in the initial consonant 

 sound. The same individuals that sang this song often uttered the 

 same syllables with the accent transferred to the second, thus : teur- 

 lee'-kee, teur-Tee'-Kee^ teur-lee'-Kee. This song was almost as common 

 as the other, and indeed a bird singing one almost always, sooner or 

 later, changed to the other. Another song often heard sounded like 

 Proc. Wash. Acad. Sci., January, 1904. 



