478 
GRANIVOROUS BIRDS. 
houses of the French inhabitants of New Orleans and its 
vicinity ; and some have succeeded in raising them in 
captivity, where plenty of room was allowed in an 
aviary. In England they have been known to build and 
lay their eggs in the orange trees of a menagerie. They 
are familiar also in the gardens and orchards, where their 
warbling notes are almost perpetually heard throughout 
the summer. Their song much resembles that of the 
Indigo Bird, but their voice is more feeble and concise. 
Soon reconciled to the cage, they will sing even a few 
days after being caught. Their food consists of rice, 
insects, and various kinds of seeds ; they collect also the 
grains of the ripe figs, and, frequenting gardens, build 
often within a few paces of the house, being particularly 
attached to the orangeries. 
Their nests are usually made in the hedges of the 
orange, or on the lower branches of the same tree, like- 
wise occasionally in a bramble or thorny bush. Exter- 
nally they are formed of dry, withered grass, blended with 
the tenacious silk of caterpillars, lined with hair, and 
internally finished with fine fibrous roots. The eggs are 
4 or 5, white, or pearly, and marked with dark purplish 
brown spots. In the mildest climates in which they pass 
the summer, they raise two broods in the season. They 
are commonly caught in trap-cages, to which they are 
sometimes allured by a stuffed bird, which they descend 
to attack ; and they have been known to survive in do- 
mestication for upwards of ten years. 
The Nonpareil is about 5| inches long, and 8J in alar extent. 
Back and scapulars glossy yellow, stained with green, and in old 
birds with red. Tail slightly forked, purplish brown (generally 
green). Legs and feet leaden-grey. Bill black above, plain grey- 
ish-blue below. Iris hazel. — Female a little less. — In the male , in 
the 2d season, the blue on the head appears ; in the next year the 
