1909] The Ottawa Naturalist. 113 



sepala grow singly as I had said, never like the other in tufts; 

 and it would be difficult to name another acaulescent purple 

 violet the leaves of- which are so far from being describable as 

 cucullate. Their almost absolute flatness contrasts strongly 

 with the constantly involute foliage of the other. Not one of the 

 marks at first attributed to V. prionosepala seems thus far to 

 fail ; but not until I had seen the two flourishing in their native 

 haunts, and on the same acre of wild land, did I apprehend the 

 matter of the difference in their respective times of flowering. 



At one or two points in this Strathroy swamp I observed 

 colonies of V . hlanda. Over and above these two I saw here 

 no other stemless violets. 



THE PRAIRIE WARBLER (DENDROICA DISCOLOR) IN 

 NORTHERN ONTARIO AND OTHER NOTES. 



By G. Eifrig, Ottawa. 



On May 11th of this year the writer found a specimen of 

 the Prairie Warbler on the edge of Lake Dore, near Eganville, 

 Renfrew County. This is a distinctly southern form, whose 

 metropoHs is, say in the latitude of the State of Maryland. The 

 northernmost points at which it has been taken so far are at 

 Mt. Forest, WelHngton County and that once only, if I mistake 

 not and at Toronto, twice. ' So its finding in Renfrew County 

 means quite an extension northward of its hitherto known 

 range. Its occurrence there proved all the more remarkable, 

 since it was a single female seen and taken, whereas in nearly all 

 species of birds, if the two sexes do not migrate together, it is 

 alwavs the males that arrive first. Besides, the weather before 

 the nth had been so uninviting, cold and rainy the ther- 

 mometer stood at 35-45 for more than a week previously, with 

 the exception of two warmer days that there were very few 

 of even the hardy northern warblers to be seen, only one Myrtle 

 Warbler and one Black and White Creeping Warbler being seen 

 in a stay of hours at the edge of the lake and in the vicmity. 

 Furthermore, whereas in its true home it is a bird that confines 

 itself strictlv to warm, dry hillsides and similar dry localities, 

 this one was laboriously clambering about in the alder bushes at 

 the water's edge, sometimes over the water. The bird was taken 

 and is now in the writer's collection. 



The occurrence of this southern species so far north seems 

 to lend weight to a theory the writer has held for several years 

 past, viz., that there is a distinct movement northward dis- 

 cernible on the part of the birds. Thus, the Chewmk (/ iptlo 



