The Western Mockingbird 
appearance in certain valleys tributary to Puget Sound. It is almost 
certain, therefore, that a few of these birds are regularly traversing our 
borders, and it is quite within the bounds of possibility that they may one 
day establish a residence in northern California. 
My friend, Dr. James Ball Naylor, of Malta, Ohio, tells the following 
story in answer to the oft-repeated question, Do animals reason? The 
poet’s house nestles against the base of a wooded hill and looks out upon 
a spacious well-kept lawn which is studded with elm trees. The place is 
famous for birds, and the neighborhood is equally famous for cats. Robins 
occasionally venture to glean angle worms upon the inviting expanses of 
this lawn, but for a bird to attempt to cross it, unaided by wing, would 
be to invite destruction, as in the case of a lone soldier climbing San Juan 
hill. One day, however, a fledgling Catbird, overweening and disobe¬ 
dient, we fear, fell from its nest overhead and sat helpless on the dreaded 
slopes. The parents were beside themselves with anxiety. The birdie 
could not fly and would not flutter to any purpose. There was no enemy 
in sight, but it was only by the sufferance of fate, and moments were 
precious. In the midst of it all the mother disappeared and returned 
presently with a fat green worm, which she held up to baby at a foot’s 
remove. Baby hopped and floundered forward to the juicy morsel, but 
when he had covered the first foot, the dainty was still six inches away. 
Mama promised it to him with a flood of encouragement for every effort, 
but as often as the infant advanced the mother retreated, renewing 
her blandishments. In this way she coaxed her baby across the lawn 
and up, twig by twig, to the top of an osage-orange hedge which bounded 
it. Here, according to Dr. Naylor, she fed her child the worm. 
No. 145 
Western Mockingbird 
A. 0 . U. No. 703a. Mimus polyglottos leucopterus (Vigors). 
Description. —Adult male: Upperparts and shading on sides of breast plain 
brownish gray (hair-brown); wings and tail slaty black, varied by white; some white 
spotting on top of middle and greater wing-coverts and tertials; a large white patch 
in wing formed by primary coverts and basal half of primaries (abruptly extended to 
near end of two innermost primaries); outermost pair of rectrices wholly white, the 
two succeeding pairs chiefly but decreasingly white; lores dusky; a whitish superciliary; 
cheeks mottled brownish gray and whitish; underparts dingy white, the chest and 
breast tinged with pale buffy brownish; wing-linings pure white, marked with dusky. 
Bill chiefly blackish; legs dusky; iris pale yellowish gray. Females are duller and with 
less of white on wings and tail. Young birds are much like adults, save that the breast 
and sides are heavily spotted with grayish. Length about 254 (10.00); wing 115 
(4-53): tail 120 (4.72); bill 18 (.71); tarsus 32.5 (1.28). 
7 H 
