BIRDS'-NESTS. 131 



maidenly love. It was really pathetic in its sweetnest 

 and childlike confidence and joy. I soon discovered 

 that the pair were building a nest upon a low branch 

 a few yards from me. The male flew cautiously to 

 the spot, and adjusted something, and the twain moved 

 on, the female calling to her mate at intervals, hve-e, 

 love-e, with a cadence and tenderness in the tone that 

 rang in the ear long afterward. The nest was sus- 

 pended to the fork of a small branch, as is usual with 

 the vireos, plentifully lined with lichens, and bound 

 and rebound with masses of coarse spider-webs. 

 There was no attempt at concealment except in the 

 neutral tints, which made it look like a natural growth 

 of the dim, gray woods. 



Continuing my random walk, I next paused in a 

 low part of the woods, where the larger trees began 

 to give place to a thick second-growth that covered 

 an old Barkpeeling. I was standing by a large ma- 

 ple, when a small bird darted quickly away from it, 

 as if it might have come out of a hole near its base. 

 As the bird paused a few yards from me, and began 

 to chirp uneasily, my curiosity was at once excited. 

 When I saw it was the female mourning ground 

 warbler, and remembered that the nest of this bird 

 Had not yet been seen by any naturalist, — that not 

 ?ven Dr. Brewer had ever seen the eggs, — I felt 

 .hat here was something worth looking for. So I 

 carefully began the search, exploring inch by inch the 

 ground, the base and roots of the tree, and the vari- 

 fus shrubby growths aboit it, till, finding nothing 



