The Scott Oriole 



earned my special 

 gratitude when on 

 a certain May 

 morning he roused 

 me, regardless, to 

 listen to a golden 

 song which poured 

 down from a syca- 

 more tree hard by. 

 Ly ti ti tee to, ti ly 

 ti ti te to, came the 

 compelling out- 

 burst. I took it 

 for a freak Mead- 

 owlark song at 

 first, but once 

 thoroughly 

 aroused, knew it 

 for an Icterine 

 carol — ly ti ti tee to, 

 ti ly ti ti tee to — 

 molten notes with 



a fond thrill to them, more restrained than the clarion of the Meadow- 

 lark, smoother and sweeter than the tumult of a Bullock Oriole, and, 

 of course, with the double repetition, a much longer song than either. 

 This episode signalized the westernmost appearance of this gifted musi- 

 cian, and necessitated, I regret to say, mortuary rites. Maturer im- 

 pressions, obtained in Arizona in a more characteristic setting of pinyons, 

 scattering live oaks, and the inevitable yuccas, confirmed the judg- 

 ment of a rare quality in this Oriole's song. Again and again we started 

 up with the thought of Meadowlark (at an unlikely altitude of 5000 

 feet) , and were as often disarmed by the subtle restraint, the unexampled 

 purity and the faint melancholy of the concluding notes. All around 

 was tense silence, dryness, and appalling heat, the desolation of mid- 

 day in the desert foothills. Ly ty ti ti tee to, ly ty ti ti tee to, cut across 

 the dry silences like the voice of a spirit treading the plains of asphodel. 

 How important an element this song becomes in the life of the high 

 deserts, Scott testifies in his classical first description of the bird's habits: 1 

 "Few birds sing more incessantly, and in fact I do not recall a species in 

 the Eastern or Middle States that is to be heard as frequently. The 

 males are, of course, the chief performers, but now and again, near a nest, 



'W. E. D. Scott, The Auk, Vol. II., Jan. 1885. 



Taken in San Bernardino County 



Photo by Wright M. Pierce 



SCOTT'S ORIOLE— A SECOND YEAR MALE 



95 



