CAT BIRD. 
105 
any other genus we have. His bill, legs and feet, 
place, and mode of building, the colour of the eggs, 
his imitative notes, food, and general manners, all 
justify me in removing him to this genus. 
The cat bird is one of those unfortunate victims, 
and indeed the principal, against which credulity and 
ignorance have so often directed the fascinating quality 
of the black snake. A multitude of marvellous stories 
have been told me by people who have themselves seen 
the poor cat birds drawn, or sucked, as they sometimes 
express it, from the tops of the trees (which, by the bye, 
the cat bird rarely visits,) one by one, into the yawning 
moutli of the immovable snake. It has so happened 
with me, that, in all the adventures of this kind that I 
have personally witnessed, the cat bird was actually 
the assailant, and always the successful one. These 
rencounters never take place but during the breeding 
time of birds ; for whose eggs and young the snake has 
a particular partiality. It is no wonder that those 
species, whose nests are usually built near the ground, 
should be the greatest sufferers, and the most solicitous 
for their safety : hence the cause why the cat bird 
makes such a distinguished figure in most of these 
marvellous narrations. That a poisonous snake will 
strike a bird or mouse, and allow it to remain till 
nearly expiring before he begins to devour it, our 
observations on the living rattlesnake, at present [ 1811 ,] 
kept by Mr Peale, satisfy us is a fact ; but that the 
same snake, with eyes, breath, or any other known 
quality he possesses, should be capable of drawing a 
bird, reluctantly, from the tree tops to its mouth, is an 
absurdity too great for me to swallow. 
I am led to these observations by a note which I 
received this morning from my worthy friend Mr 
Bartram : “ Yesterday,” says this gentleman, “ I 
observed a conflict, or contest, between a cat bird and 
a snake. It took place in a gravel walk, in the garden, 
near a dry wall of stone. I was within a few yards of 
the combatants. The bird pounced or darted upon the 
