Those who have seen this bird only in the day, can form but an imperfect idea of its activity, and even sprightliness, in its proper season of exercise. Throughout the day, it was all stillness and gravity; its eyelids half shut, its neck contracted, and its head shrunk seemingly into its body; but scarcely was the sun set, and twilight began to approach, when its eyes became full and sparkling, like two living globes of fire; it crouched on its perch, reconnoitred every object around with looks of eager fierceness; alighted and fed; stood on the meat with clenched talons, while it tore it in morsels with its bill; flew round the room with the silence of thought, and perching, moaned out its melancholy notes, with many lively gesticulations, not at all accordant with the pitiful tone of its ditty, which reminded one of the shivering moanings of a half-frozen puppy.

This species is found generally over the United States, and is not migratory.

The Red Owl is eight inches and a half long, and twenty-one inches in extent; general colour of the plumage above, a bright nut brown or tawny red; the shafts black; exterior edges of the outer row of scapulars white; bastard wing, the five first primaries, and three or four of the first greater coverts, also spotted with white; whole wing quills spotted with dusky on their exterior webs; tail rounded, transversely barred with dusky and pale brown; chin, breast, and sides, bright reddish brown, streaked laterally with black, intermixed with white; belly and vent white, spotted with bright brown; legs covered to the claws with pale brown hairy down; extremities of the toes and claws pale bluish, ending in black; bill a pale bluish horn colour; eyes vivid yellow; inner angles of the eyes, eye-brows, and space surrounding the bill, whitish; rest of the face nut brown; head horned or eared, each consisting of nine or ten feathers, of a tawny red, shafted with black.

ORDER II. PICE. PIES.

GENUS 4. LANIUS. SHRIKE.

SPECIES 1. LANIUS EXCUBITOR?*

GREAT AMERICAN SHRIKE, OR BUTCHER-BIRD.

[Plate V.-Fig. 1.]

La Pie-grièche grise, BUFF. 1, 296. Pl. enl. 445.-White WhiskyJohn, Phil. Trans. v. LXII, p. 386.—Arct. Zool. v. 11, No. 127. -PEALE'S Museum, No. 664.

THE form and countenance of this bird bespeak him full of courage and energy; and his true character does not belie his appearance, for he possesses these qualities in a very eminent degree. He is represented in the plate rather less than his true size; but in just proportion; and with a fidelity that will enable the European naturalist to determine, whether this be really the same with the great Cinereous Shrike, (Lanius excubitor, Linn.) of the eastern continent or not; though the progressive variableness of the plumage, passing, according to age, and sometimes to climate, from ferruginous to pale ash, and even to a bluish white, renders it impossible that this should be an exact representation of every individual.

This species is by no means numerous in the lower parts of Pennsylvania; though most so during the months of November, December and March. Soon after this it retires to the north, and to the higher inland parts of the country to breed. It frequents the deepest forests; builds a large and compact nest in the upright fork of a small tree; composed outwardly of dry grass, and whitish moss, and warmly lined within with feath* Lanius septentrionalis, GMEL.

VOL. I.-X X

ers. The female lays six eggs, of a pale cinereous colour, thickly marked at the greater end with spots and streaks of rufous. She sits fifteen days. The young are produced early in June, sometimes towards the latter end of May; and during the greater part of the first season are of a brown ferruginous colour on the back.

When we compare the beak of this species, with his legs and claws, they appear to belong to two very different orders of birds; the former approaching, in its conformation, to that of the Accipitrine; the latter to those of the Pies; and, indeed, in his food and manners he is assimilated to both. For though man has arranged and subdivided this numerous class of animals into separate tribes and families, yet nature has united these to each other by such nice gradations, and so intimately, that it is hardly possible to determine where one tribe ends, or the succeeding commences. We therefore find several eminent naturalists classing this genus of birds with the Accipitrine, others with the Pies. Like the former he preys, occasionally, on other birds; and like the latter on insects, particularly grasshoppers, which I believe to be his principal food; having at almost all times, even in winter, found them in his stomach. In the month of December, and while the country was deeply covered with snow, I shot one of these birds, near the head waters of the Mohawk river, in the state of New York, the stomach of which was entirely filled with large black spiders. He was of a much purer white, above, than any I have since met with; though evidently of the same species with the present; and I think it probable, that the males become lighter coloured as they advance in age, till the minute transverse lines of brown on the lower parts almost disappear.

In his manners he has more resemblance to the pies than to birds of prey, particularly in the habit of carrying off his surplus food, as if to hoard it for future exigences; with this difference, that Crows, Jays, Magpies, &c. conceal theirs at random, in holes and crevices, where perhaps it is forgotten or never again found; while the Butcher-bird sticks his on thorns

and bushes, where it shrivels in the sun, and soon becomes equally useless to the hoarder. Both retain the same habits in a state of confinement, whatever the food may be that is presented to them.

This habit of the Shrike of seizing and impaling grasshoppers, and other insects, on thorns, has given rise to an opinion, that he places their carcasses there, by way of baits, to allure small birds to them, while he himself lies in ambush to surprise and destroy them. In this, however, they appear to allow him a greater portion of reason and contrivance than he seems entitled to, or than other circumstances will altogether warrant; for we find that he not only serves grasshoppers in this manner, but even small birds themselves, as those have assured me who have kept them in cages in this country, and amused themselves with their manœuvres. If so, we might as well suppose the farmer to be inviting Crows to his corn, when he hangs up their carcasses around it, as the Butcher-bird to be decoying small birds by a display of the dead bodies of their comrades!

In the "Transactions of the American Philosophical Society," vol. iv, p. 124, the reader may find a long letter on this subject, from Mr. John Heckewelder, of Bethlehem, to Dr. Barton; the substance of which is as follows: That on the 17th of December, 1795, he (Mr. Heckewelder) went to visit a young orchard, which had been planted a few weeks before, and was surprised to observe on every one of the trees one, and on some, two and three grasshoppers, stuck down on the sharp thorny branches; that on inquiring of his tenant the reason of this, he informed him, that they were stuck there by a small bird of prey called by the Germans Neuntoedter (Ninekiller,) which caught and stuck nine grasshoppers a day; and he supposed that as the bird itself never fed on grasshoppers, it must do it for pleasure. Mr. Heckewelder now recollected that one of those Ninekillers had, many years before, taken a favourite bird of his out of his cage, at the window; since which he had paid particular attention to it; and being perfectly satisfied that it lived entirely on mice and small birds, and, moreover, ob

serving the grasshoppers on the trees all fixed in natural positions, as if alive, he began to conjecture that this was done to decoy such small birds as feed on these insects to the spot, that he might have an opportunity of devouring them. "If it were true," says he, "that this little hawk had stuck them up for himself, how long would he be in feeding on one or two hundred grasshoppers? But if it be intended to seduce the smaller birds to feed on these insects, in order to have an opportunity of catching them, that number, or even one half, or less, may be a good bait all winter," &c. &c.

This is indeed a very pretty fanciful theory, and would entitle our bird to the epithet Fowler, perhaps with more propriety than Lanius, or Butcher; but, notwithstanding the attention which Mr. Heckewelder professes to have paid to this bird, he appears not only to have been unacquainted that grasshoppers were in fact the favourite food of this Ninekiller, but never once to have considered, that grasshoppers would be but a very insignificant and tasteless bait for our winter birds, which are chiefly those of the Finch kind, that feed almost exclusively on hard seeds and gravel; and among whom five hundred grasshoppers might be stuck up on trees and bushes, and remain there untouched by any of them forever. Besides, where is his necessity of having recourse to such refined stratagems, when he can at any time seize upon small birds by mere force of flight! I have seen him, in an open field, dart after one of our small sparrows, with the rapidity of an arrow, and kill it almost instantly. Mr. William Bartram long ago informed me, that one of these Shrikes had the temerity to pursue a Snow-bird (F. Hudsonia,) into an open cage, which stood in the garden; and before they could arrive to its assistance, had already strangled and scalped it, though he lost his liberty by the exploit. In short I am of opinion, that his resolution and activity are amply sufficient to enable him to procure these small birds whenever he wants them, which I believe is never but when hard pressed by necessity, and a deficiency of his favourite insects; and that the Crow or the Blue Jay may, with the same probability, be