198 KENTUCKY WARBLER.
The female resembles the male, but wants the black band under the
eye, and has the black of the head less extended backwards. The tints
of the plumage generally are also lighter.
Dimensions nearly the same.
MAGNOLIA AURICTJLATA, Wild. Sp. PI. vol. ii. p. 1268. Pursh. Flof. Amer. vol. ii.
p. 482. Mich. Arbr. Forest, de l'Amer. Septentr. vol. iii. p. 94. PL 7.—POLYANDRIA
POLYGYNIA, Linn. MAGNOLIA, JUSS.
This species, which is remarkable for the beauty of its foliage, is known
in America by the names of White Cucumber Tree, Long-leaved Cucumber
Tree, and Indian Physic. The latter name it has obtained from the
circumstance of its bark being used in intermittent fevers. It is characterized
by its rhomboido-oboval acute leaves, which are narrowed and
two-lobed at the base; and its ovate acute petals. The flowers are
greenish-white.
( 199 )
THE CRESTED TITMOUSE.
PJRUS BICOLOR, LINN.
P L A T E X X X I X . MALI: A N D F E M A L E .
A L T H O U G H this smart little bird breeds in the State of Louisiana and
the adjacent districts, it is not there found in so great numbers as in the
Middle States, and farther to the northward. It generally prefers the
depth of the forests during summer, after which it approaches the plantations,
and even resorts to the granaries for corn.
Its flight is short, the bird being seldom seen on the wing long
enough to cross a field of moderate extent. It is performed by repeated
flaps of the wings, accompanied by jerks of the body and tail, and occasions
a rustling noise, as it takes place from one tree to another. It
moves along the branches, searches in the chinks, flies to the end of twigs
and hangs to them by its feet, whilst the bill is engaged in detaching a
beech or hazel nut, an acorn or a chinquapin, upon all of which it
feeds, removing them to a large branch, where, having secured them in
a crevice, it holds them with both feet, and breaks the shell by repeated
blows of its bill. They are to be seen thus employed for many minutes
at a time. They move about in little companies formed of the parents
and their young, eight or ten together, and escorted by the Nuthatch or
the Downy Woodpecker. It is pleasing to listen to the sound produced
by their labour, which in a calm day may be heard at the distance of
twenty or thirty yards. If a nut or an acorn is accidentally dropped,
the bird flies to the ground, picks it up, and again returns to a branch.
They also alight on the ground or on dry leaves, to look for food, after
the trees become bare, and hop about with great nimbleness, going to the
margins of the brooks to drink, and when unable to do so, obtaining water
by stooping from the extremity of a twig hanging over the stream.
In fact, they appear to prefer this latter method, and are also fond of
drinking the drops of rain or dew as they hang at the extremities of the
leaves.
Their notes are rather musical than otherwise, the usual one being
loud and mellow. They do not use the tee-tec-tee of their relative the
Black-capped Titmouse, half so often as the latter does, but emit a con