SPECIES 3. FRINGILLA PUSILLA. 
FIELD SPARROW. 
[Plate XVI.— Fig. 2.] 
Passer agrestis, Bautram, p. 291. — Peale’s Museum, iVc. 6560. 
This is the smallest of all our Sparrows, and in Pennsylvania 
is generally migratory. It arrives early in April, frequents dry 
fields covered with long grass, builds a small nest on the ground, 
generally at the foot of a briar, lines it with horse hair; lays six 
eggs so thickly sprinkled with ferruginous as to appear alto- 
gether of that tint; and raises two and often three, broods in a 
season. It is more frequently found in the middle of fields and 
orchards than any of the other species, which usually lurk along 
hedge rows. It has no song; but a kind of chirrupping not much 
different from the chirpings of a cricket. Towards Fall they 
assemble in loose flocks in orchards and corn-fields, in search of 
the seeds of various rank weeds; and are then very numerous. As 
the weather becomes severe, with deep snow, they disappear. 
In the lower parts of North and South Carolina I found this spe- 
cies in multitudes in the months of January and February. 
When disturbed they take to the bushes, clustering so close to- 
gether that a dozen may easily be shot at a time. I continued to 
see them equally numerous through the whole lower parts of 
Georgia; from whence, according to Mr. Abbot, they all dis- 
appear early in the spring. 
None of our birds have been more imperfectly described than 
that family of the Finch tribe usually called Sparrows. They 
have been considered as too insignificant for particular notice, 
yet they possess distinct characters, and some of them pecu- 
liarities, well worthy of notice.. They are innocent in their ha- 
bits, subsisting chiefly on the small seeds of wild plants, and sel- 
