546 HISTORY OF THE 



Dimensions of a pair in ' ' The Goss Ornithological Collection:" 



Iris dark brown; bill — upper black, under bluish; legs and 

 feet dark grayish blue; claws brown. 



These little Warblers frequent the edges of woodlands and the 

 banks of streams, where fringed with trees, low bushes and tall 

 weeds, also the orchards and gardens. Thej are very lively 

 and easy in their motions, as they flit here and there in search 

 of caterpillars and other leaf-eating forms of life, often hanging 

 head downward at the end of slender branches and swaying 

 about much like the Titmice. They are also quite expert insect 

 catchers on the wing. They occasionally puncture the grapes 

 with their bills and eat the pulp or succulent part, but they are 

 not abundant enough to be considered injurious, even if fruit 

 were as natural a food as insect life; as it is, it can only be con. 

 sidered a freak, or for a dessert. In 1879 I called attention to 

 the fact in the Nuttall Ornithological Club Bulletin, Yol. 5, p. 48. 

 I can find no other mention of the same, and am inclined to 

 think the habit is not a general one. 



Their call note, often repeated, is a low but sharp "Chip" or 

 "Tweet," and their song a feeble, varied warble, too squeaky to 

 be musical. I have never been so fortunate as to find their nests, 

 or see their eggs, and very little is definitely known in regard 

 to their nesting habits, farther than that, like all the species of 

 this genus, it usually nests on the ground. Doctor Brewer, in 

 "North American Land Birds," says: 



"A nest of this Warbler (Smith. Coll., 3476), obtained on 

 the northern shore of Lake Superior by George Barnston, is 

 but little more than a nearly flat bed of dry, matted stems of 

 grass, and is less than an inch in thickness, with a diameter of 

 about three inches. It is not circular in shape, and its width 

 is not uniform. Its position must have been on some flat sur- 

 face, probably the ground. The eggs resemble those of all the 

 family in having a white ground, over which are profusely dis- 

 tributed numerous small dots and points of a reddish brown. 



