106 
GEEAT 
AMERICAN 
S II R I K E. 
hedge-rows, orchards and meado-\vs, and disappears again early in 
April. 
The Great American Shrike is ten inches in length, and thirteen in 
extent ; the upper part of the head, neck and back, is pale cinereous ; 
sides of the head nearly white, crossed ■\vitli a bar of black, that passes 
from the nostril through the eye to the middle of the neck ; the whole 
under parts, in some specimens, are nearly white, and tliickly marked 
with minute transverse curving lines of light brown ; the wings are 
black, tipped with white, with a single spot of white on the primaries, 
just below their coverts ; the scapulars, or long downy feathers that 
fall over the upper part of the wing, are pure white ; the rump and 
tail-coverts a very fine gray or light ash ; the tail is cuneiform, con- 
sisting of twelve feathers, the two middle ones wholly black, the others 
tipped more and more with white to the exterior ones, which are nearly 
all white ; the legs, feet and claws, are black ; the beak straight, thick, 
* of a light blue color ; the upper mandible furnished with d sharp pro- 
cess bending down greatly at the point, where it is black, and beset at 
the base with a number of long black hairs or bristles ; the nostrils are 
also thickly covered with recumbent hairs ; the iris of the eye is a 
light hazel, pupil black. The figure in the plate will give a perfect 
idea of the bird. The female is easily distinguished by being ferru- 
ginous on the back and head ; and having the band of black extend- 
ing only behind the eye, and of a dirty brown or burnt color, the under 
parts are also something rufous, and the curving lines more strongly 
marked ; she is rather less than the male, which is different from birds 
of prey in general, the females of M hich are usually the larger of the 
two. 
In the Arctic Zoology we are told that this species is frequent in 
Russia, but does not extend to Siberia ; yet one was taken within 
Behring's straits, on the Asiatic side, in lat. 66° ; and the species pro- 
bably extends over the whole continent of North America, from the 
western ocean. Mr. Bell, while on his travels through Russia, had one 
of these birds given him, which he kept in a room, having fixed up a 
sharpened stick for him in the wall ; and on turning small birds loose 
in the room, the Butcher-bird instantly caught them by the throat in 
such a manner as soon to suffocate them ; and then stuck them on the 
stick, pulling them on with bill and claws ; and so served as many as 
were turned loose, one after another, on the same stick.* 
* Edwards, v. vii., p. 231. 
