![]() The old birds were sufficiently shy, but the young were observed hopping and croaking around us, and tugging at any offal of flesh meat thrown out, like so many Vultures. The young birds were so familiar and greedy, approaching the encampment in quest of food, as to be easily taken by the Indian boys, when they soon become reconciled to savage domesticity. ![]() ![]() The following notice regarding our bird was given me by my friend THOMAS NUTTALL:-"On the 15th of July, arriving at the borders of the Shoshonee, or Snake river, we first met with the Common Magpie on our route, mostly accompanied by the Raven, but there were no Crows. SWAINSON, in the Fauna Boreali-Americana, remarks on comparing them:-"We cannot perceive the slightest difference whereon to build even the character of a variety, much less a species " and this truly is my own opinion. Nob." the European bird being at the same time ticketed "Pica melanoleuca." Mr. Captain SABINE thought differently, and CHARLES BONAPARTE, after remarking in his "Observations on the Nomenclature of WILSON," that "it is not a little singular that this species, which is so common in every part of Europe, should be confined in its range on this continent to the western and northern regions," thus plainly indicating his belief of their identity, names it, in a list of European and North American Birds, published in London in April 1838, "Pica Hudsonica. THOMAS NUTTALL, who has seen those of both countries, as well as their nests, and observed their habits, assures me, that he looks upon them as clearly of the same species. There is a difference of opinion as to the identity of the Magpie of America and that of Europe. These intrepid travellers first observed the Magpie near the great bend of the Missouri, although it was known to have been obtained at the fur-trading factories of the Hudson's Bay Company. "Our horses," he says, "were obliged to scrape the snow away to obtain their miserable pittance and, to increase their misfortune, the poor animals were attacked by the Magpies, who, attracted by the scent of their sore backs, alighted on them, and, in defiance of their wincing and kicking, picked many places quite raw the difficulty of procuring food rendering those birds so bold as to alight on our men's arms, and eat meat out of their hands." To CLARKE and LEWIS, however, is due the first introduction of this bird into the Fauna of the United States. His notice, although already published by WILSON, so well describes the habits of this species, that I repeat it here with pleasure. RICHARDSON, some of them spend the winter, none have yet been seen nearer the shores of the Atlantic than the head waters of the Red river in Louisiana, where they were seen in abundance by the lamented Colonel PIKE, then a lieutenant in the United States' army. Although Magpies are abundant in the north-western portions of the United States, and are met with as far north as the Saskatchewan river, where, according to Dr.
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