388 CANADA FLYCATCHER. 



are in their usual health. Still, however, the effect might 

 have been different, had the daily food of the bird been cockle 

 burs, instead of Indian corn. 



CANADA FLYCATCHER. (Muscicapa Canadensis.) 



PLATE XXVI.— Fig. 2. 



Linn. Syst. 324.— Arct. Zool. p. 338, No. 273.— Lath. ii. 354. 

 Peak's Museum, No. 6969. 



SETOPHAGA CANADENSIS.— Swainson.* 

 Sylvia pardalina, Bonap. St/nop. p. 79. 



This is a solitary, and, in the lower parts of Pennsylvania, 

 rather a rare species ; being more numerous in the interior, 

 particularly near the mountains, where the only two I ever 

 met with were shot. They are silent birds, as far as I could 

 observe ; and were busily darting among the branches after 

 insects. From the specific name given them, it is probable 

 that they are more plenty in Canada than in the United 



* Mr Swainson in a note to the " Northern Zoology," has hinted his 

 suspicion that this bird and Muscicapa Bonapartii of Audubon are the 

 same : as far as we can judge from, the two plates, there does not seem 

 any resemblance. Mr Swainson adds, "As regards the generic name (of 

 Setophaga Bonapartii), we consider the whole structure of the bird as 

 obviously intermediate between the Sylvicolce and the typical Setophagce, 

 but more closely allied to the latter than the former." For the present, 

 we shall place the two following species in Setophaga, but suspect that 

 this intermediate form will hereafter rank in the value of a sub-genus. 1 

 To this also may be referred the Muscicapa Selbii of Audubon, which 

 seems to approach nearer Setophaga in the more flattened representation 

 of the bill, and stronger bristles. Mr Audubon has only met with it 

 three times in Louisiana. The upper parts are of a dark olive colour ; 

 the whole under parts, with a streak over each eye, rich yellow. The 

 length is about five inches and a half ; it was very active in pursuit of 

 flies, and the snapping of the bill, when seizing them, was distinctly 

 heard at some distance. — Ed. 



1 They are all furnished with rictorial bristles ; but the bill is not so much 

 depressed. The habits are those of Setophaga. 



