( 4G )
S E L B Y ' S FLY-CATCHER.
MUSCÍCAPA SELBII.
P L A T E IX. MALE.
THE works of every student of nature are always pleasing to me,
and it is with delight that I see the number of such students daily increasing
; but when I meet with one who, regardless of the labour attending
upon figuring in their full size the objects from which he has derived
his knowledge, my heart expands, and I hail his name with enthusiasm.
Mr SELBY'S great work is so well known to the scientific world, that I
need only here mention the favour which its accomplished author has conferred
upon me by permitting me to decorate one of my pages with his
name, in quality of foster-father to a beautiful and hitherto unknown
species of Fly-catcher.
As this bird, to the day on which my engraving of it appeared, had
not been described, or, in as far as I know, obtained by any other person
than myself, notwithstanding the great number of individuals who have
of late years been searching our States for new and rare species, it must
be considered as of very unfrequent occurrence, and probably as seldom
•going farther north or east than the place where I discovered it. Moreover,
it is so scarce even there, that in,all my walks I only shot three individuals,
in the course of nine years. In no instance have I been able
to cultivate its society longer than a few minutes, as, before it might
escape from me, I was obliged to shoot it, in order to satisfy myself that
it was indeed a different bird from any figured or described in books.
My journal, under the date of 1st July 1821, contains the following
statement:—" I found this bird about three miles from St Francisville in
Louisiana, whilst engaged in searching for a Turkey, which I had
wounded. It was afternoon, and the heat oppressive. I saw it innocently
approaching us until within a few yards, anxiously looking, as if
trying to discover our intentions; but as we stood motionless, it once
came so near that I could easily have reached it with my gun barrel.
It moved nimbly among the twigs of the low bushes, making now and
then short dashes at flies, which it swallowed after killing them under
foot, as many other Fly-catchers are in the habit of doing, then peeping at
us, and again setting off in pursuit of flies. The snapping of its bill
SELBY'S FLY-CATCHER. -17
when seizing an insect, was sharp, and as distinct as if the bird had boon
in my hand. At length, fearing that it might escape, I desired my
young friend JOSEPH MASON to retire further from it, that we might
si loot it."
On the 4th July, while searching with care about the same place, to
find its nest or the female, I shot another of these birds, which I found
to be a female. It differed only in being rather smaller, darker above,
and paler beneath. On the 27th September of the same year, I shot
a second male in beautiful plumage, six or seven miles off, in a different
direction, in the same State. Finding the pretty flower on which the
bird is drawn, in the immediate neighbourhood, and growing wild,
although I am assured it is originally from Europe, I have represented
it, thinking it might contrast well with the Fly-catcher in its richly
coloured flowers, and be assimilated to it in that of its stem and leaves.
This flower is found in damp places, in Louisiana only, at least I have
not met with it in the woods of any other State.
SELBY'S FLY-CATCHEB, MUSCÍCAPA SELBII.
Adult Male. Plate X.
Bill longish, depressed, tapering to a sharp point, very broad at the
base, the gap reaching to nearly under the eye; upper mandible slightly
notched and inflected at the tip ; lower straight. Nostrils basal, lateral,
linear. Head and neck of moderate size. Body somewhat slender.
Feet moderately long, slender; tarsus covered with short scutella above,
with a longitudinal keeled plate behind, longer than the middle toe;
toes slender, unconnected ; claws small, weak, slightly arched, compressed,
acute.
Plumage blended, soft and glossy. The beak margined at the base
with long spreading bristles. Wings of moderate length, third quill
longest, second and first little shorter, the other quills graduated. Tail
rather long, forked when closed, rounded when spread, the feathers
acuminate.
Bill brown, horn-colour above, passing into dark flesh-colour below.
Iris dark brown. Legs, feet, and claws very light flesh-colour. The
whole upper parts dark olive ; wings black, the feathers margined externally
with light olive, internally with white. The whole under parts, in