CEDAR BIRD, OR CHERRY BIRD. 251 
struction with the thoughtless and rapacious sportsman ; 
who, because many of these unfortunate birds can be 
killed in an instant, sitting in the same range, thinks the 
exercise of the gun must be credited only by the havock 
which it produces against a friendly, useful, and innocent 
visitor. 
Towards the close of May, or beginning of June, the 
Cherry-birds, now paired, commence forming the cradle of 
their young; yet still so sociable are they, that several nests 
may be observed in the same vicinity. The materials 
and trees chosen for their labors are various, as well as the 
general markings of their eggs. Two nests, in the Botanic 
Garden at Cambridge, were formed in small hemlock # 
trees, at the distance of 16 or 18 feet from the ground, 
in the forks of the main branches. One of these was com- 
posed of dry, coarse grass, interwoven roughly with a con- 
siderable quantity of dead hemlock sprigs, further con- 
nected by a small quantity of silk-weed f lint, and lined 
with a few strips of thin grape-vine bark, and dry leaves of 
the silver fir. In the second nest the lining was merely 
fine root fibres. On the 4th of June this nest contained 2 
eggs ; the whole number is generally about 4 or 5 ; these 
are of the usual form (not remarkable for any disproportion 
of the 2 ends), of a pale clay white, inclining to olive, 
with a few well defined black or deep umber spots at the 
great end, and with others seen, as it were, beneath the 
surface of the shell. Two or three other nests were made 
in the Apple-trees of an adjoining orchard, one in a place 
of difficult access, the other on a depending branch easily 
reached by the hand. These were securely fixed hori- 
zontally among the ascending twigs, and were formed 
externally of a mass of dry, wiry weeds ; the materials 
being firmly held together by a large quantity of Cud- 
* Mies canadensis. L. 
f Asclefrias , species. 
