CEDAR BIRD. 
269 
by the almost continual fluttering of the bird among 
thick branches of the cedar. The feathers of those 
birds, which are without these appendages, are uni- 
formly found ragged on the edges ; but smooth and 
perfect in those on whom the marks are full and 
numerous. These singular marks have been usually 
considered as belonging to the male alone, from the 
circumstance, perhaps, of finding female birds without 
them. They are, however, common to both male and 
female. Six of the latter are now lying before me, 
each with large and numerous clusters of eggs, and 
having the waxen appendages in full perfection. The 
young birds do not receive them until the second fall, 
when, in moulting time, they may be seen fully formed, 
as the feather is developed from its sheath. I have 
once or twice found a solitary one on the extremity of 
one of the tail feathers. The eye is of a dark blood 
colour ; the legs and claws, black ; the inside of the 
mouth, orange ; gap, wide ; and the gullet capable of 
such distension as often to contain twelve or fifteen 
cedar berries, and serving as a kind of craw to prepare 
them for digestion. No wonder, then, that this glutton- 
ous bird, with such a mass of food almost continually 
in its throat, should want both the inclination and 
powers for vocal melody, that which would seem to 
belong to those only of less gross and voracious habits. 
The chief difference in the plumage of the male and 
female consists in the dulness of the tints of the latter, 
the inferior appearance of the crest, and the narrowness 
of the yellow bar on the tip of the tail. 
Though I do not flatter myself with being able to 
remove that prejudice from the minds of foreigners, 
which has made them look on this bird, also, as a 
degenerate and not a distinct species from their own ; 
yet they must allow that the change has been very 
great, very uniform, and universal, all over North 
America, w^here I have never heard that the European 
species has been found ; or, even if it were, this would 
only shew more clearly the specific difference of the 
