338 NESTS AND EOOS OF 



all our natural songsters the Bobolink is the most noted and popular. Descriptions 

 of his song so frequently appear in literature that even those who have not heard it 

 must form a good idea of its enchanting music: 



" That rollicking, jubilant whistle, 

 That rolls like a brooklet along— 

 That sweet flageolet of the meadows, 

 The bubbling, bobolink song." 

 Often have I heard him sing when on the wing, or when at rest, with the broad, 

 meadow and pasture lands spread before him, perched on. the top of a wind-beateu 

 reed, with his wings sunward spread, his head erect, his white and black bacK 

 glistening in the sunlight, pouring forth his "bubble-ing" bobolink notes to the azure 

 windows of heaven. In the South he is known as the Rice-bird, in the Middle States 

 as Reed-bird and Meadow-wink, and in the North as Skunk Blackbird. The nesting 



494. Bobolink. 



time is in the latter part of May or in June. The nest of the Bobolink is very hard to 

 find;, it Is built in a natural cavity of the ground, amongst the tall grass of mea,dows; 

 sometimes it is sunk in the depression made by a cow's or a horse's hoof. Fields of 

 clover, with here and there a tall weed-staii or sapling, on which the birds alight, are 

 favorite nesting resorts. In leaving the nest the female will run off through the 

 grass quite a distance before rising, and she will repeat the same performance upon 

 her return, so that the nest can only be found by diligent and careful search In the 

 ' vicinity from which she arises. The eggs, too, resemble the color of the ground so 

 closely that they are easily overlooked. The nest is a very slight affair, made of dry 

 grasses and weed-stems, arranged in a circular form. The eggs are usually five, 

 sometimes six or seven in number, and of a dull white or grayish-white, variously 

 tinged with light drab, olive reddish and grayish-brown, intermingled with laven- 

 der; the general effect being that of a dark, heavily-colored egg. Ten specimens 

 measure: .79x.55, .80x.55, .86x.60, .84x.63, .87x.58, .87x.61, .88x.66, .86x.61, .83x.60, 

 .85X.60. An average specimen measures .85x.64. 



■jf-+0 495.' COWBIRD. Molothrus ater (Bodd.) Geog. Dist.— Whole of the United 

 States, north into Southerni British Columbia, south in winter to Mexico. 



■ Known as the Cow Bunting or Cow Blackbird from its habit of alighting on the 

 backs of cows or cattle, where it sits contentedly while they are grazing. It is a 



