272 
TYRANT FLYCATCHER. 
than a month old. This appeared also to have been its original 
colour, as it issued from the egg. The skin waS yellowish white ; 
the eye much lighter than usual; the legs and bill blue. It was 
plump and seemingly in good order. I presented it to Mr. Peale. 
Whatever may be the cause of this loss of colour, if I may so 
call it, in birds, it is by no means uncommon among the various 
tribes that inhabit the United States. The Sparrow Hawk, Spar- 
row, Robin, Red- winged Blackbird, and many others, are oc- 
casionally found in white plumage; and I believe that such birds 
do not become so by climate, age or disease, but that they are 
universally hatched so. The same phenomena are observable not 
only among various sorts of animals, but even among the human 
race; and a white negro is no less common, in proportion to 
their numbers, than a white Blackbird; though the precise cause 
of this in either is but little understood. 
