308 
SINGIXG BIRDS. 
for the South about the middle or close of August, or as soon 
as the young are well able to endure the fatigue of an extensive 
migration in company with their parents. The female shows 
great solicitude for the safety of her only brood, and on an 
approach to the nest appears to be in great distress and appre- 
hension. When they are released from her more immediate 
protection, the male, at first cautious and distant, now attends 
and feeds them with activity, being altogether indifferent to 
that concealment which his gaudy dress seems to require from 
his natural enemies. So attached to his now interesting brood 
is the Scarlet Tanager that he has been known, at all hazards, 
to follow for half a mile one of his young, submitting to feed 
it attentively through the bars of a cage, and, with a devotion 
which despair could not damp, roost by in the branches of the 
same tree with its prison ; so strong, indeed, is this innate and 
heroic feeling that life itself is less cherished than the desire 
of aiding and supporting his endearing progeny (Wilson). 
The food of the Scarlet Tanager while with us consists 
chiefly of winged insects, wasps, hornets, and wild bees, as 
well as smaller kinds of beetles and other shelly tribes ; it 
probably also sometimes feeds on seeds, and is particularly 
partial to whortleberries and other kinds which the season 
affords. 
About the beginning of August the male begins to moult, 
and then exchanges his nuptial scarlet for the greenish livery 
of the female. At this period these birds leave us ; and having 
passed the winter in the celibacy indicated by this humble 
garb, they arrive again among us on its vernal renewal, and 
so soon after this change that individuals are at this time occa- 
sionally seen with the speckled livery of early autumn, or with 
a confused mixture of green and scarlet feathers in scattered 
patches. 
The Scarlet Tanager is common throughout this Eastern Prov- 
ince north to about latitude 44°, and occurs sparingly along the 
Annapolis valley, in Nova Scotia and along the valley of the St. 
John in New Brunswick, also near the city of Quebec and in the 
vicinity of Lake Winnipeg. It winters in the West Indies and 
northern South America. 
