LITTLE OR HERMIT THRUSH. 347 



This species, so much like the Nightingale in color, 

 is scarce inferior to that celebrated bird in its powers of 

 song, * and greatly exceeds the Wood Thrush in the 

 melody and sweetness of its lay. It inhabits the United 

 States, from the lofty alpine mountains of New Hamp- 

 shire to Florida. It is also met with on the table land 

 of Mexico, and in the warmer climate of the Antilles. 

 In Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New England, at the 

 close of autumn, it appears to migrate eastward to the 

 sea-coast in quest of the winter berries, on which it now 

 feeds; in spring and summer it lives chiefly on insects 

 and their larvae, and also collects the surviving berries of 

 the Mitchella repens. 



Like the preceding species, it appears to court solitude, 

 and lives wholly in the woods. In the Southern States, 

 where it inhabits the whole year, it frequents the dark 

 and desolate shades of the cane swamps. In these, almost 

 Stygian regions, which, besides being cool, abound prob- 

 ably with its favorite insect food, we are nearly sure to 

 meet our sweetly vocal hermit flitting through the settled 

 gloom, which the brightest rays of noon scarcely illumine 

 with more than twilight. In one of such swamps, in the 

 Choctaw nation, Wilson examined a nest of this species, 

 which was fixed on the horizontal branch of a tree, form- 

 ed with great neatness and without using any plastering 

 of mud. The outside was made of a layer of coarse 

 grass, having the roots attached, and intermixed with 

 horse-hair ; the lining consisted of green filiform blades 

 of dry grass, very neatly wound about the interior. The 

 eggs, 4 to 6, of a pale greenish blue, were marked towards 

 the great end with specks and blotches of olive. 



* My friend, Mr. C. Pickering, remarks, that the song of this species is far superior 

 to that of the Wood Thrush. Wilson considered it mute. 



