Brown, Olive or Grayish Brown, and Brown and Gray Sparrowy Birds 
trees, in buildings, or hollow wooden columns, only one of 
which they intend to use. Six white eggs is the proper number 
for a household, but Dr. Coues says the female that has been 
robbed keeps on laying three or even four sets of eggs without 
interruption. 
Meadowlark 
(Sturnella magna) Blackbird family 
Called also: FIELD LARK; OLDFIELD LARK 
Length — io to 1 1 inches. A trifle larger than the robin. 
Male — Upper parts brown, varied with chestnut, deep brown, and 
black. Crown streaked with brown and black, and with a 
cream-colored streak through the centre. Dark-brown line 
apparently running through the eye ; another line over the 
eye, yellow. Throat and chin yellow ; a large, conspicuous 
black crescent on breast. Underneath yellow, shading into 
buffy brown, spotted or streaked with very dark brown. 
Outer tail feathers chiefly white, conspicuous in flight. Long, 
strong legs and claws, adapted for walking. Less black in 
winter plumage, which is more grayish brown. 
-Female — Paler than male. 
-Range — North America, from Newfoundland to the Gulf of Mexico, 
and westward to the plains, where the Western meadowlark 
takes its place. Winters from Massachusetts and Illinois 
southward. 
Migrations — April. Late October. Usually a resident, a few re- 
maining through the winter. 
In the same meadows with the red-winged blackbirds, birds 
of another feather, but of the same family, nevertheless, may be 
found flocking together, hunting for worms and larvae, building 
their nests, and rearing their young very near each other with 
the truly social instinct of all their kin. 
The meadowlarks, which are really not larks at all, but the 
blackbirds’ and orioles’ cousins, are so protected by the coloring 
of the feathers on their backs, like that of the grass and stub- 
ble they live among, that ten blackbirds are noticed for every 
meadowlark, although the latter is very common. Not until you 
flush a flock of them as you walk along the roadside or through 
the meadows and you note the white tail feathers and the black 
crescents on the yellow breasts of the large brown birds that rise 
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