THE WARBLING VIREO. 247 



oftener heard than seen. Nearly the size of a canary, 5.50 

 long and 9.00 in extent, olivaceous-green above and yel- 

 lowish-white beneath, it so nearly resembles the leaves 

 as it glides softly and gracefully through the tree-tops 

 that one must look sharply to detect it. But it is so 

 utterly absent-minded as it flits and peers among the 

 branches, meanwhile abandoning itself to its song, that one 

 may come almost as near to it as one pleases. Though, 

 like the rest of the Vireos, it takes its food and moves about 

 like a Warbler, the bill, hooked and notched, broad at base 

 and well bristled, reminded the older ornithologists of the 

 Flycatchers, while its general structure now brings this 

 family near the Shrikes — a group of birds of altogether 

 different habits of voice, food and nidification. The family 

 Vireonidce is entirely of the New World, and the genus Vtreo, 

 to which this warbling species belongs, is almost exclusively 

 of North America, while the species itself pertains to the 

 eastern parts. As in the case of the Vireos in general, male 

 and female are alike. Like all the rest of its genus, it hangs 

 by its edge a delicate pensile nest on the elastic twigs of 

 some bush or tree; in the case of gilvus^ almost always 

 high up in the tree; the eggs, some .80X.55, being of a 

 most delicate or flesh-tinted white, barely specked with dark- 

 brown or black, are among the most beautiful of birds' eggs. 



The nests and eggs of the Vireos can never be mistaken, 

 so wholly different are they from the nests and eggs of all 

 other birds. Never shall I forget the tender sense of the 

 beautiful which stole over me in the days of childhood, as 

 I first beheld a nest of this bird. A very fairy-like basket 

 of jewels it seemed. 



A warbling Vireo's nest, now before me, is hung on very 

 small twigs at their junction with a larger upright twig, 

 and is slightly fastened around the latter. It is woven of 



