The song of the tanager is much like the robin song, but having once learned it, a sharp ear can easily tell them apart, for it is of a different tone. It is rather hoarse, not so smooth as a robin's voice. The common call is a hoarse and very distinct "chip, chur," given by both of the pair. Several years ago I saw a scarlet tanager in a bird store. It was winter, and I brought him home to keep till it was safe to set him free in the spring. He was very timid, and did not like to have any one look at him, especially when he went to eat. If I happened to look at him when he was at his food-dish, he would instantly fly to his top perch, and look as if he would never eat again. So I partitioned off one corner of his cage for a private dining-room, by a strip of stiff paper woven between the wires. After that it was very droll to see him retire behind the screen and eat, now and then sticking up his head to glance over the top, and see if I were looking. I found it hard to please him with food. He liked living insects, but he wanted to catch them for himself. So I got some sticky fly-paper, and hung it up outside the kitchen door. When I had caught half a dozen flies, I took it up to him. He was not in a cage, and the minute he saw the flies he flew across the room and hovered before me like a big hummingbird, while he daintily picked off every fly. He forgot that he didn't like to have me see him eat. After that I was fly-catcher every day till he learned to like mockingbird food. In the spring he began to sing--a sweet, low song, different from the common tanager song. Then I took him out to the country, away from the English sparrows, and set him free. The SUMMER TANAGER nests in the Southern States from New Jersey to Florida. He is all red, but otherwise looks like the scarlet tanager, and his habits are about the same. The LOUISIANA TANAGER nests in the Western States from the Plains to the Pacific. He is brighter, with a variety of colors. He is mostly bright yellow, with brilliant red head, and black wings and tail, and his mate--like other female tanagers--is in olive green. He is a shy bird, and lives in the woods, and his habits have been very little studied. I once saw a pair of these birds in Utah, getting their breakfast. At least, the gay singer himself was at that business, though his sharp-eyed mate was too busy watching me to see that I did not mean any harm, to care for food. They were on a long fence, catching flies. One would fly out a little way, his bill snapping as he seized the fly, and then return to the fence a little farther off. Every time he came back he alighted farther away, though he did not seem even to see me. His mate kept between him and me, and never took her eyes from me. I feared she would go hungry, so I came away and left them. FOOTNOTE: [14] See Appendix, 13. XVI THE SPARROW AND FINCH FAMILY (_Fringillidæ_)[15]