THE YELLOW-BREASTED GHAT. 
161 
tangled and almost impenetrable patches of briars, sumach, prickly ash, and 
different species of smilax, wherever a rivulet or a pool may be found. 
As in other migratory species, the males precede the females several days. 
As soon as they have arrived, they give free vent to their song at all hours 
of the day, renewing it at night when the weather is calm, and the moon 
shines brightly, seeming intent on attracting the females, by repeating in 
many varied tones the ardency of their passion. Sometimes the sounds are 
scarcely louder than a whisper, now they acquire strength, deep guttural 
notes roll in slow succession as if produced by the emotion of surprise, then 
others clear and sprightly glide after each other, until suddenly, as if the 
bird had become confused, the voice becomes a hollow bass. The performer 
all the while looks as if he were in the humour of scolding, and moves from 
twig to twig among the thickets with so much activity and in so many 
directions, that the notes reach the ear as it were from opposite places at the 
same moment. Now the bird mounts in the air in various attitudes, with 
its legs and feet hanging, while it continues its song and jerks its body with 
great vehemence, performing the strangest and most whimsical gesticula- 
tions ; the next moment it returns to the bush. If you imitate its song, it 
follows your steps with caution, and responds to each of your calls, now and 
then peeping at you for a moment, the next quite out of sight. Should you 
have a dog, which will enter its briary retreat, it will skip about him, scold 
him, and frequently perch, or rise on wing above the thicket, so that you 
may easily shoot it. 
The arrival of the females is marked by the redoubled exertions of the 
males, who now sing as if delirious with the pleasurable sensations they 
experience. Before ten days have elapsed, the pairs begin to construct their 
nest, which is placed in any sort of bush or briar, seldom more than six feet 
from the ground, and frequently not above two or three. It is large, and 
composed externally of dry leaves, small sticks, strips of vine bark and 
grasses, the interior being formed of fibrous roots and horse-hair. The eggs 
are four or five, of a light flesh colour, spotted with reddish-brown. In 
Louisiana and the Carolinas, these birds have two broods in the season ; but 
in Pennsylvania, where they seldom lay before the 20th of May, they have 
only one brood. The eggs are hatched in twelve days. The male is seldom 
heard to sing after the breeding season, and they all depart from the Union 
by themiddle of September. Their eggs and young are frequently destroyed 
by snakes, and a species of insect that feeds on carrion, and- burrows in the 
ground under night. The young resemble the females, and do not acquire 
the richness of the spring plumage while in the Union. 
The food of the Yellow-breasted Chat consists of coleopterous insects and 
Vol. IV. 23 
