NATURAL HISTORY. 



53 



string to its unfinished nest when one end 

 caught on the branch. The sudden stop- 

 page of its flight had looped the slack cord 

 around the robin's neck and strangled it. 

 W. C. Cottright, Wyoming, Pa. 



INTRODUCING FRIENDS. 



Please name for me the 3 birds I shall 

 describe : 



A small bird about the size of a canary; 

 dark blue, almost indigo, all over, except 

 the under part of its tail and wings, which 

 are a brownish gray. 



A swallow which builds a nest on the 

 rafters of buildings. The nest is made of 

 mud and is open at the top. The bird is 

 a little longer than a sparrow, but not so 

 heavily built. The entire upper parts ap- 

 pear black, but I think they are dark pur- 

 ple. The under parts are light chestnut. 

 The tail is long and deeply forked. The 

 2 outer feathers are over 2 inches long. 

 The others are shorter and have a white 

 band across them,. 



A swallow that builds under the eaves. 

 The nest is closed above, with a small 

 hole leading in at the side. Birds are 

 dark purple above, with a bright chestnut 

 patch on the rump. Their under oarts 

 are pale chestnut. There is a small white 

 spot just above the beak on the forehead. 

 Their tails are not forked and they are 

 more heavily built than the other kind.. 

 H. H. Clark, Maple Park, 111. 



ANSWER. 



Mr. C. William Beebe, assistant cura- 

 tor of birds in the Zoological park, iden- 

 tifies the birds described by Mr.. Clark, as 

 follows: 



Indigo bunting, Passcrina cyanca. 



Barn swallow, Chelidon erythrogaster. 



Cliff or eave swallow Petrochelidon 

 Ittfiifrons. 



Mr. Beebe says Mr. Clark has the rare 

 gift of picking out the chief characteristics 

 of a bird for identification. — Editor. 



THE DIPPER, OR WATER OUZEL. 

 In July Recreation C. W. Morgaridge 

 asks for some light on the habits of the 

 water ousel, saying he has detected this 

 little acrobat in questionable tricks. Does 

 he refer to the American dipper, Cinchus 

 mexicanusf For 16 years, in Idaho, 

 this jolly little fellow has been one of 

 my most intimate avian friends, and dur- 

 ing all that time I have never detected 

 him doing anything that a decent and 

 self-respecting bird should not do. I have 

 sat hours beside some brawling mountain 

 torrent and watched a pair of dippers feed- 

 ing their young and have never seen so 

 much as a minnow carried to the nest. 

 Their food, during the breeding season, 



consists almost exclusively of the larvae 

 of the salmon fly that abounds in all 

 Western streams during that season. The 

 bird is one of our few winter residents; 

 descending from the higher mountain 

 stream to the larger rivers where there 

 is little danger of a sudden freeze shutting 

 off its food supply. The examination of 

 several crops of those killed during the 

 winter showed an almost total absence of 

 animal food, but a great deal of vegetable 

 matter gathered from the rocks along the 

 rivers and from drifts. Let no man injure 

 one of these birds thinking thereby to per- 

 petuate the trout supply. 



C. S, Moody, Sand Point. Ida. 



PROBABLY A WIDGEON. 

 Several years ago, while snipe shooting, 

 I saw a duck swimming on a small lake 

 near here. Having secreted myself behind 

 a stone wall I asked a friend to go around 

 the lake and drive the duck across. This 

 he did. and when about 8 rods from me, 

 the bird rose almost perpendicularly from 

 the water. I shot and killed it. I give 

 color and measurements : Length, 18^4 

 inches; wing, from first joint to tip, 10^2 

 inches; tail $ l / 2 inches; tarsus, 1^4 inches. 

 Head similar to that of black duck, only 

 perhaps a little lighter; belly, white; breast, 

 back and neck, a yellowish grey ; speculum, 

 dark green, the first feather being nearly 

 white ; crissum, white with brown spots ; 

 bill, bluish ; feet and tarsus, dusky. 1 he 

 bird resembles a gadwall more than any 

 duck I know, and is evidently a river duck, 

 as indicated by its hind toe. Should you 

 be unable to identify it, kindly submit it 

 to the readers of your excellent journal. 

 W. A. Mead, Carmel, N, Y. 



ANSWER. 



The description answers more nearly to 

 a female American widgeon or baldpate 

 (Mareca americana) , or the female Europ- 

 ean widgeon {Mareca penelopc), than to 

 any other river duck. — Editor. 



THEY WERE ALL MULE DEER. 



I have read your answer to Mr. Morris. 

 Also the letter by Mr. Lea in regard to the 

 mule deer of the Northwest. I trapped 

 one winter in California, and deer meat 

 was one of our staple articles, both for food 

 and for bait. We procured it from a spe- 

 cies of deer that the natives called mule- 

 tail, named, as they told me. from the 

 long, bushy tail like unto a mule's tail new- 

 ly trimmed. It is the only deer they have 

 in that part of California and in Oregon; 

 farther South and West, and in the coast 

 range, can be found plenty of blacktail 

 deer. I see the Universal dictionary de- 

 fines mule deer as you do. A California 

 writer defines mule deer as a hybrid of the 



