140 CRESTED TITMOUSE. 



the singularity of whose notes surprised me. Having shot 

 him from off the top of a very tall tree, I found it to be the 

 black-headed titmouse, with a long and deep indentation in 

 the cranium, the skull having been evidently, at some former 

 time, drove in and fractured, but was now perfectly healed. 

 Whether or not the change of voice could be owing to this 

 circumstance, I cannot pretend to decide. 



CRESTED TITMOUSE. (Parus bicolor.) 



PLATE VIII.— Fig. 5. 



Parus bicolor, Linn. Syst. i. 544, 1. — La mesange hupp^e de la Caroline, Buff. v. 

 451. — Toupet Titmouse, Arct. Zool. i. No. 324. — Lath. Syn. iv. 544, 11. — 

 PeaWs Museum, No. 7364. 



PARUS BICOLOR.— Linnaeus. 



Parus bicolor, Bonap. Synop. p. 100. — The Crested Titmouse, Aud. pi. 39. Om. 

 Biog. i. p. 198. 



This is another associate of the preceding species ; but more 

 noisy, more musical, and more suspicious, though rather less 

 active. It is, nevertheless, a sprightly bird, possessing a 

 remarkable variety in the tones of its voice, at one time not 

 much louder than the squeaking of a mouse, and a moment 

 after whistling aloud, and clearly, as if calling a dog; and 

 continuing this dog-call through the woods for half an hour 

 at a time. Its high-pointed crest, or, as Pennant calls it, 

 toupet, gives it a smart and not inelegant appearance. Its 

 food corresponds with that of the foregoing ; it possesses con- 

 siderable strength in the muscles of its neck, and is almost 

 perpetually digging into acorns, nuts, crevices, and rotten parts 

 of the bark, after the larvae of insects. It is also a constant 

 resident here. "When shot at and wounded, it fights with 

 great spirit. "When confined to a cage, it soon becomes 

 familiar, and will subsist on hemp-seed, cherry stones, apple 



authentic source ; it is perhaps exaggerated. Feeding on carrion, which 

 they have also been represented to do, must in a wild state be from 

 necessity. Mr Audubon asserts it as a fact, with regard to the P. bicolor. 

 Mr Selby has seen P. major eat young birds. — Ed. 



