While in the United States, it lives retired, and separates itself from most other species. Little flocks, consisting of a family or two, take possession of some low well-covered thicket, by the side of some clear streamlet, where they spend the winter unmolested, searching for food among the fallen and withered leaves, or among the roots and dead branches of trees. Should a warm morning dawn on their retreat, the male birds directly ascend to the middle branches of the brambles, and in a soft under tone cheer the females with their melodies. At all other times they remain comparatively silent, merely emitting a note to call each other, or to assure their little family that all is safe around them. Towards spring a kind of bustle takes place in their camp: the males, already warmed with affection and love, renew their attentions to their mates; new connections are formed by the young; their song becomes much improved; and the passer by may here and there see a pair moving slowly and cautiously towards the land whence they had emigrated some months before.
Follow these birds wherever you will, you invariably find them not in deep woods, but along the fences, and amid patches of briars and tangled underwood, which at all times seem so pleasing to them. They traverse the whole of the Union by day, resting here and there awhile, to watch the gradual improvement of the season.
They enter the British Provinces full of joy, and lavish of song. Many are well pleased to remain there, but the greater number pursue their course to revisit the Magdeleine Islands, Newfoundland, and the country of Labrador. There you find them in every pleasant dell, where no sooner have they arrived than each searches for a safe retreat in which to place its nest. This is in due time replenished with eggs; and, while the female sits on them with care and anxiety, her devoted lover chants the blessings they both enjoy.
The flight of this bird is low, rapid, and undulating. While passing over the Gulf of St Lawrence, it flies swiftly, at a moderate height, without uttering any note. They appear to be able to travel to a considerable distance, without the necessity of alighting, and I have thought that they may accomplish the passage of the Gulf without resting on any of its islands. As soon as they alight, they betake themselves to the deepest thickets.
During the breeding season, their plumage has a richness which it does not exhibit in the winter months, while with us. Indeed some of the males at that time are so highly coloured as to be of a bright red rather than of a brown tint; and their appearance, as they pass from one bush to another, or skip from stone to stone, is extremely pleasing. I have attempted to represent this colouring in the Plate.
Would that I could describe the sweet song of this finch; that I could convey to your mind the effect it produced on my feelings, when wandering on the desolate shores of Labrador!—that I could intelligibly tell you of the clear, full notes of its unaffected warble, as it sat perched on the branch of some stunted fir. There for hours together was continued the delightful serenade, which kept me lingering about the spot. The brilliancy and clearness of each note, as it flowed through the air, were so enchanting, the expression and emphasis of the song so powerful, that I never tired of listening. But, reader, I can furnish no description of the melody.
While in South Carolina, in January 1834, after I had returned from the country where this species breeds, I happened, one fair day, to meet with a group of these birds. They were singing in concert. Never shall I forget the impression which their notes made on me: I suddenly stopped and looked around; for a moment I imagined that I had been by magic transported to the wilds of Labrador; but how short was the duration of these feelings!—a hawk sailed over the spot of their concealment, and in an instant all was silent as the tomb.
The nest of the Fox-coloured Sparrow, which is large for the size of the bird, is usually placed on the ground, among moss or tall grass, near the stem of a creeping fir, the branches of which completely conceal it from view. Its exterior is loosely formed of dry grass and moss, with a carefully disposed inner layer of finer grasses, circularly arranged; and the lining consists of very delicate fibrous roots, together with some feathers from different species of water-fowl. In one instance I found it composed of the down of the Eider-duck. The period at which the eggs are laid, is from the middle of June to the 5th of July. They are proportionally large, four or five in number, rather sharp at the smaller end, of a dull greenish tint, sprinkled with irregular small blotches of brown. I think that the description given in the splendid work of my friends Swainson and Richardson, of the eggs of this species, must have been taken from those of the White-crowned Bunting, as it agrees precisely with eggs which I have found in many nests of that bird.
When one approaches the nest, the female affects lameness, and employs all the usual arts to decoy him from it. They raise only one brood in the season. The young, before they depart for the United States, already resemble their parents, which have by this time lost much of the brilliancy of their colouring. They leave Labrador about the 1st of September, in small groups, formed each of a single family. When in that country, and in Newfoundland, I frequently observed them searching along the shores for minute shell-fish, on which they feed abundantly.
Many of these birds are frequently offered for sale in the markets of Charleston, they being easily caught in "figure-of-four traps!" Their price is usually ten or twelve cents each. I saw many in the aviaries of my friends Dr Samuel Wilson and the Reverend John Bachman, of that city. To the former I am indebted for the following particulars relative to this species, part of which I was myself witness to.