88 
MUSCICAPA FORFICATA. 
white at their bases. The three exterior feathers on 
each side are of a delicate pale rosaceous colour on a 
considerable part of their length from the base. The 
external one is five inches and a half long ; the second 
and third gradually decrease in length, but the fourth 
is disproportionately shorter, and from this feather 
there is again a gradual decrease to the sixth, which is 
little more than two inches long. 
The female of the swallow-tailed flycatcher is probably 
very similar to the male, but the colours of the young 
bird are much less vivid, and the exterior tail-feathers 
are much shorter than those of the adult. 
The swallow-tailed flycatcher is as audacious as the 
kingbird, attacking with unhesitating intrepidity, and 
turning the flight of the most powerful of the feathered 
tribe. Its note consists of a chirping, sounding like 
tsch, tschy much resembling that of the prairie dog, 
(. Arctomys ludoviciana , Ord,) by which it deceived the 
members of Long’s party into a belief that they were 
approaching one of the villages of this animal. 
“ A note, like that of the prairie dog, (writes Say,) 
for a moment induced the belief that a village of the 
marmot was near, but we were soon undeceived by the 
appearance of the beautiful Tyr annus forficatus in full 
pursuit of a crow. Not at first view recognizing the 
bird, the fine elongated tail plumes occasionally diverging 
in a furcate manner, and again closing together, to give 
direction to the aerial evolutions of the bird, seemed 
like extraneous processes of dried grass, or twigs of a 
tree, adventitiously attached to. the tail, and influenced 
by currents of wind. The feathered warrior flew forward 
to a tree, whence, at our too near approach, he 
descended to the earth, at a little distance, continuing 
at intervals his chirping note. This bird seems to be 
rather rare in this region ; but, as the very powder 
within the barrels of our guns was wet, we were 
obliged to content ourselves with only a distant view 
of it.” 
The range of the swallow-tailed flycatcher appears 
to be limited to the trans-Mississippian territories, lying 
