BALTIMORE ORIOLE. 
143 
terior feather on each side a quarter of an inch shorter than the others ; 
legs and feet light blue or lead color ; iris of the eye hazel. 
The female has the head, throat, upper part of the neck and back, of 
a dull black, each feather being skirted with olive yellow, lower part of 
the back, rump, upper tail-coverts, and whole lower parts, orange yellow, 
but much duller than that of the male ; the whole wing feathers are of 
a deep dirty brown, except the quills, which are exteriorly edged, and 
the greater wing-coverts, and next superior row, which are broadly 
tipped, with a dull yellowish Mdiite ; tail olive yellow ; in some specimens 
the two middle feathers have been found partly black, in others wholly 
so ; the black on the throat does not descend so far as in the male, is 
of a lighter tinge, and more irregular ; bill, legs, and claws light blue. 
Buffon, and Latham, have both described the male of the bastard Bal- 
timore {Oriolus S2)urius), as the female Baltimore. Pennant has com- 
mitted tlie same mistake ; and all the ornithologists of Europe, with 
whose works I am acquainted, who have undertaken to figure and 
describe these birds, have mistaken the proper males and females, and 
confounded the two species together in a very confused and extraor- 
dinary manner, for which indeed we ought to pardon them, on account 
of their distance from the native residence of these birds, and the strange 
alterations of color which the latter are subject to. 
This obscurity I have endeavored to clear up in the present volume of 
this work, PI. IV., by exhibiting the male and female of the Oriolus sjni- 
rius in their different changes of dress, as well as in their perfect plu- 
mage ; and by introducing representations of the eggs of both, have, I 
hope, put the identity of these two species beyond all further dispute or 
ambiguity. 
Almost the whole genus of Orioles belong to America, and with a few 
exceptions build pensile nests. Few of them, however, equal the Balti- 
more in the construction of these receptacles for their young, and in 
giving them, in such a superior degree, convenience, warmth, and secu- 
rity. For these purposes he generally fixes on the high bending extremi- 
ties of the branches, fastening strong strings of hemp or flax round two 
forked twigs, corresponding to the intended width of the nest ; with the 
same materials, mixed with quantities of loose tow, he interweaves or 
fabricates a strong firm kind of cloth, not unlike the substance of a hat 
in its raw state, forming it into a pouch of six or seven inches in depth, 
lining it substantially with various soft substances, well interwoven with 
the outward netting, and lastly, finishes with a layer of horse hair ; the 
whole being shaded from the sun and rain by a natural pent-house, or 
canopy of leaves. As to a hole being left in the side for the young to 
be fed, and void their excrements through, as Pennant and others relate, 
it is certainly an error : I have never met with anything of the kind in 
the nest of the Baltimore. 
