BLUEBIRD 79 



During the bitter winter of 1895 most of them 

 were killed through this part of the country and 

 farther north; their frozen bodies were picked 

 up where they had fallen from starvation, along 

 roads and in fields, while many being too ex- 

 hausted for flight fell easy victims to hawks, cats, 

 and other natural enemies. Other species also 

 suffered, but it was not until about 1900 that the 

 Bluebirds reappeared in anything like their for- 

 mer numbers. They were so greatly missed that 

 during this period many people resolved hence- 

 forth to keep feeding-stations replenished during 

 snowy weather, that such a calamity might not 

 occur again. For this bird's disposition is as 

 celestial as its coloring, and he is as welcome to 

 everyone as he is familiar to most. 



Dusky blue and bronze in winter, the feathers 

 become brighter in the spring molt; the breast 

 is then colored like new plowed earth in the "old 

 red hills of Georgia," and the back and wings of 

 the male a rich blue, like a fallen fragment of 

 the middle sky, whereas the color of the female 

 is less vivid. The Bluebird is often confused 

 with the Indigo Bunting, but may be distin- 

 guished by the rusty-red breast and by the beak, 

 which is narrow and black, while the other is a 

 true Finch, with beak conical and thick and col- 

 ored like the feathers. 



