182 
General Notes. 
[July 
the hardly-to-be-mistaken song of this bird. Next morning I was on the 
ground early, heard the song again, and finally obtained a sight of the 
singer so closely as to render the identification complete ; but unfortun- 
ately failed to secure him. During the following week I looked for him 
every morning and evening, but he was no more to be heard or seen. 
The record of this bird for Massachusetts (for all New England as well), 
as given in the latest work .(Coues’s Stearns of 1881), embraces three 
examples, no one of which was taken in the spring, unless possibly the 
first, in 1845, when -the month is not given. 
I send this note with hesitation, mindful of the ancient comparision of 
values of “a bird in hand,” etc. (a low estimate from an Ornithological 
point of view !), but as I saw distinctly the white outer tail-feathers so 
characteristic of Chondestes, and heard the remarkable Canary-like notes 
several times, I consider the identification positive. — F. C. Browne, Fra- 
mingham , Mass. 
The Meadow Lark ( Sturnella magna) in Vermont in Winter. — 
This species generally leaves for the south by the middle of October and 
I have never', till now, noted them later than this. On December 9, 1882, 
I shot a male in this vicinity, the ground at the time being covered with 
three inches of snow. On dissection the crop was found to be filled with 
an unrecognizable mass of insects, probably beetles. — F. H. Knowlton, 
Middlebury , Vt. 
Geococcyx as a Vocalist. — Whilst out on a ramble a few weeks since 
in the foot-hills near San Diego, I chanced to make the (to me) interest- 
ing discovery of the possession of considerable vocal powers by the Road- 
runners. I had stopped for a few moments’ rest and shelter from a noon- 
day sun, beneath the scant shade of an elder tree, and as I lay enjoying 
my “siesta” I heard from a hill-side in front of me what I at first thought to 
be the cooing of a Dove. I probably would have paid no particular atten- 
tion had it not been that a friend with me, inquiring what it was that 
made the cry, I undertook to show him the supposed Dove. Again, and 
a third time, the cry was repeated before I could discover the originator, 
and when I did I could not at first credit my eyes when my ears had been 
so at fault. Not a tree or bush of decent size could be seen as a shelter 
for my Dove, and I marvelled that it should “coo” so contentedly from 
such a lonely site, and this it was that stimulated search — ocular search — 
for the author of the now mysterious cry. 
The hill-side being only scantily covered by a scattering growth of 
cactus and low bushes, permitted a thorough looking over, and yet it was 
some minutes before I saw its only occupant and the vocalist whose some- 
what ventriloquial notes had puzzled me, a male Geococcyx calif or nianus. 
Standing near the summit of the hillock, amidst his favorite cactus, and 
with outstretched neck and head bent down, he would utter, as if by pro- 
digious effort, the lugubrious notes I had wrongly thought the cooing of 
the Dove. At each iteration of the cry he seemed to make a renewed 
