4o6 
FLYCATCHERS. 
tion of currants (of which he only eats perhaps when confined), 
he refuses all exotic productions, contenting himself with 
blackberries, whortle-berries, the berries of the sassafras, cornel, 
viburnum, elder, poke, and five-leaved ivy. Raisins, foreign 
currants, grapes, cherries, peaches, pears, and apples were 
never even tasted when offered to a bird of this kind, which I 
had many months as my pensioner ; of the last, when roasted, 
sometimes, however, a few mouthfuls were relished in the 
absence of other more agreeable diet. Berries he always swal- 
lowed whole, grasshoppers, if too large, were pounded and 
broken on the floor as he held them in his bill. To manage the 
larger beetles was not so easy ; these he stnick repeatedly against 
the ground, and then turned them from side to side, by throwing 
them dexterously into the air, after the manner of the Toucan, 
and the insect was uniformly caught reversed, as it descended, 
with the agility of a practised cup-and-ball player. At length 
the pieces of the beetle were swallowed, and he remained still 
to digest his morsel, tasting it distinctly soon after it entered 
the stomach, as became obvious by the ruminating motion of 
his mandibles. When the soluble portion was taken up, large 
pellets of the indigestible legs, wings, and shells, as likewise 
the skins and seeds of berries, were, in half an hour or less, 
brought up and ejected from the mouth in the manner of the 
Hawks and Owls. When other food failed he appeared very 
well satisfied with fresh minced meat, and drank water fre- 
quently, even during the severe frosts of January, which he 
endured without much difficulty j basking, however, like Dio- 
genes, in the feeble beams of the sun, which he followed round 
the room of his confinement, well satisfied when no intnrder 
or companion threw him into the shade. Some very cold 
evenings he had the sagacity to retire under the shelter of a 
depending bed-quilt, was very much pleased with the warmth 
and brilliancy of lamp-light, and would eat freely at any hour 
of the night. Unacquainted with the deceptive nature of 
shadows, he sometimes snatched at them for the substances 
they resembled. Unlike the Vieros, he retired to rest without 
hiding his head in the wing, and was extremely watchful. 
