214 BLACK-HEADED GROSBEAK. 



The Ground Hemlock. 

 Taxus canadensis, Willd., Sp. PI., vol. iv. p. 856. Parsch, Fior. Amer. Sept., vol. ii. 



p. 647. — DlECIA MONADELPHIA. — CONIFERS, JuSS. 



The ground hemlock, or Canadian yew, is abundant on the declivities of 

 the mountains from Maryland to Maine. It is a low tree, or rather bush, 

 often almost prostrate, and frequently hanging from the rocks. The leaves 

 are linear, distichous, revolute at the margin. The berries, which are oblong 

 or globular, and of a pale red colour, are eatable. 



BLACK -HEADED GROSBEAK. 



- COCCOBORUS MELANOCEPHALUS, Swains. 



PLATE CCVI.— Male and Female. 



The following account of this Grosbeak affords another proof of the ardent 

 zeal of my excellent friend Thomas Nuttall, who, though more especially 

 engaged with botany on his recent journey to the Columbia, has not neglect- 

 ed opportunities of noting many interesting facts relative to birds. 



"On the central table-land of the Rocky Mountains, and on the upper 

 branches of the Colorado of the west, we first heard the powerful song of 

 this most delightful Finch. From thence, in the thick groves of all the 

 streams on our western course to the borders of the Columbia, and through- 

 out the dense forests of that river nearly to the sea, we were frequently 

 cheered amidst the wildest desolation by the inimitable voice of this 

 melodious bird. Jealous of all intrusion on his lonely and wild haunts, it 

 was seldom that we had the opportunity of witnessing this almost fairy 

 musician, which gave a charm to the saddest gloom, and made the very 

 woods as it were re-echo to his untiring song. With the modesty of superior 

 merit, and almost with the solicitude of the Nightingale, our favourite Finch 

 seeks the darkest thicket of the deepest forest. The moment his eye rests 

 on the intruding observer he flits off in haste, calls to his mate, and plunging 

 into the thicket sits in silence till he is satisfied of the restoration of solitude, 

 when he again cautiously mounts the twig and pours out afresh the oft-told 



