The Mockingbird at Portland, Maine, in Winter. — On January 19, 

 1897, at noon, a Mockingbird {Miintis polygloUos) appeared in a gutter 

 wliich runs beneath the south window of mj study. The thermometer 

 was below zero, and there was no snow, but an unclouded sun had 

 softened the ice in the gutter so that the bird could moisten his tongue ; 

 and this he seemed to be doing when I first saw him. He was perhaps 



five feet distant from my chair, and I noted at once that he looked like a 

 wild bird, his ruffled plumage being in prefect condition, unfrayed and 

 unstained. In a moment he caught sight of me and flew away. 



A heavy snow-storm set in the next day. It was followed within the 

 week by another. Wintry weather prevailed generally up to January 29. 

 On that day I was told by a neighbor — Edward Woodman, Esq. — that 

 he believed a Mockingbird had been visiting his grounds for several days. 

 There, on January 31, I saw the bird again. He was rather shy and quite 

 silent, and soon flew away. 



I published a notice of this interesting winter visitor in the Portland 

 'Daily Press' of February 2, hoping, if he were an escaped cage bird, 

 that the fact would thus be brought out. Nothing, however, was elicted. 

 Enquiries of local bird fanciers also failed to lead to the knowledge of 

 any lost pet bird. 



I now met with the wanderer nearly every day. About tliree o'clock of 

 the afternoon of February 11, the sun shining warmly in a still, crisp air, 

 he took up a position in the top of a tall elm before the same window from 

 which I first saw him, and sang loudly for a few moments when he was 

 apparently frightened away by passers-by. On February 15, I saw him 

 for the last time, feeding on the berries of a mountain-ash. Four days 

 later, — just one month from his first appearance, — Mrs. Charles J. Chap- 

 man, a neighbor and an entirely competent witness, reported to me that 

 he had that morning visited her grounds in search of mountain-ash 

 berries. 



I have been able to find but one previous record of a supposed wild . 

 Mockingbird in Maine, — a very indefinite note by Mr. G. A. Boardman 

 in the 'American Naturalist,' Vol. V, April, 1871, p. 121. It is this note, 

 apparently, to which reference is made in ' New England Bird Life,' 

 Vol. I, p. 62. — Nathan Clifford Browk, Portland, Me. 



Reappearance of the Mockingbird at Portland, Maine. — On March 6, 

 1897, just after my note' on his previous visits had gone to press and 

 more than a fortnight after his last appearance up to that tiine, the 

 Portland Mockingbird was seen by my mother in the woodbine on her 

 house. 1 was at once sent for to make the identification certain. I had 

 no difficulty in doing so, for he stayed quietly for a long time in the top 

 of a small tree close to the house. A period of eighteen days followed 

 during which he was not to be found, though I looked for him constantly 

 about the city and its suburbs. On March 24 he was seen by Mr. Charles 

 E. Noyes, who reported him singing. On March 28 he was seen by Mr. 

 W. H. Dennett, and was carefully studied through an opera glass within 

 a distance of some thirty yards. On neither of these occasions was he 

 more than an eighth of a mile from the spot where he first appeared in 

 January. Finally, on April 4. I met with him again myself, this time in 

 an old and little used cemetery in the same section of the city as before. 

 I walked within a few yards of him, and watched him for several minutes 

 while he disputed with some Robins the right to a cluster of sumacs, the 

 fruit of which had no doubt helped to carry him through the winter. Up 

 to the present time (June i), I have neither seen him nor heard of him 

 since. If he stayed no later than April 4, he passed nearly eleven weeks 

 in the neighborhood of Portland at the most inclement season of the year. 

 — Nathan Clifford Brown, A/e. I- XJk tlV^ J,),. X'k^-l) 



