58 
AMERICAN CROSSBILL. 
and were not afterwards so beautiful as they were at first. One of 
them, he says, was colored very much like the Green-finch (Loxia 
Ohloris). The Purple-finch, though much smaller, has the rump, head, 
back and breast nearly of the same color as the Pine Grosbeak, feeds 
in the same manner, on the same food, and is also subject to like changes 
of color. 
Since writing the above I have kept one of these Pine Grosbeaks, a 
male, for more than half a year. In the month of August those parts 
of the plumage which were red became of a greenish yellow, and con- 
tinue so still. In May and June its song, though not so loud as some 
birds of its size, Mas extremely clear, mellow and sweet. It would 
warble out this for a whole morning together, and acquired several of 
the notes of a Red-bird (L. eardinalis), that hung near it. It is exceed- 
ingly tame and familiar, and when it wants food or water utters a con- 
tinual melancholy and anxious note. It was caught in winter near the 
North river, thirty or forty miles above New York. 
Genus XXXV. CURVIROSTRA. CROSSBILL. 
Species I. C. AMERICANA* 
AMERICAN CROSSBILL. 
[Plate XXXI. Fig. 1, Male —Kg. 2, Female.f] 
On first glancing at the bill of this extraordinary bird one is apt to 
pronounce it deformed and monstrous ; but on attentively observing the 
use to which it is applied by the owner, and the dexterity with which he 
detaches the seeds of the pine tree from the cone, and from the husks 
that enclose them, we are obliged to confess on this as on many other 
occasions where we have judged too hastily of the operations of nature, 
that no other conformation could have been so excellently adapted to 
the purpose ; and that its deviation from the common form, instead of 
being a defect or monstrosity, as the celebrated French naturalist 
insinuates, is a striking proof of the wisdom and kind superintending 
care of the great Creator. 
This species, is a regular inhabitant of almost all our pine forests 
situated north of 40°, from the beginning of September to the middle 
of April. It is not improbable that some of them remain during sum- 
* This is not a new species, as supposed by Wilson, but the Loxia curvirostra, 
Linn. Ed. 10, p. 171. 
f This is an adult male ; fig. 1 is a young bird. 
