514 VIREO SOLITARIUS CASSINI 



Unfortunately, her nest was pillaged by a Black-billed Cuckoo, 

 and I was unable to observe her feed her young, as 1 had hoped 

 to do." 



The eggs are four or five in number, in no respect remarkable 

 on comparison with those of other large Vireos, being of the 

 usual shape, with a pure white ground-color, to which the con- 

 tents lend a slight blush when the egg is fresh, and speckled 

 with reddish, sometimes over the whole surface, but oftener 

 chiefly about the larger end ; they measure about three-fourths 

 of an inch in length by one-half of an inch in breadth — rather 

 over than under those dimensions. 



It has never happened to me to hear the nuptial song of the 

 Blue-headed Vireo, to which Mr. Burroughs accords such high 

 and feeling praise. Dr. Brewer regards it as bearing no 

 resemblance to that of any other Greenlet. " It is a prolonged 

 and very peculiar ditty, repeated at frequent intervals and 

 always identical. It begins with a lively and pleasant warble, 

 of a gradually ascending scale, which at a certain pitch sud- 

 denly breaks down into a falsetto note. The song then rises 

 again in a single high note, and ceases. For several summers 

 the same bird has been heard, near my house in Hingham, in 

 a wild pasture, near the edge of a wood, always singing the 

 same refrain, during the month of June." 



€as»siii's Greenlet 



Tireo solitarius cassini 



VIreo CaSSlnil, Xant. Pr. Phila. Acad. 1858, 117; 1859, 191 (Fort TejoD, Cal.).—Bd. BNA. 



1858, 340 J ed. of 1860, pi. 78, f. l.—Bd. Rov. AB. 1866, 347 (in text).— Bidgrw. Pvep. Expl. 



40th Par. iv. pt. iii. 1877, 449. 

 lanivlreo solitarins var. cassini, B. B. & B. NAB. i. 1874, 376. 

 Vlreo solitarius var. cassinl, Hensh. Eep. Orn. Specs. 1874, 105 (Arizona).— ?J5ren«A. ListB. 



Ariz. 1875, 115.— Hensh. Zool. Expl. W. 100 Merid. 1875, 223 (Arizona). 



In addition to typical solitarius, or what has not been in any way dis- 

 tinguished from it, the Coloradan region furnishes a somewhat peculiar, 

 though very closely allied, form, — the Vireo cassini of Xantus. This has lat- 

 terly been taken for the most part as a mere plumage of V. solitarius, and it is 

 not yet certain that it is anything more. Though quoted by Professor Baird 

 and myself as a simple synonym, it has been more recently distinguished 

 varietally by Mr. Ridgway, and some facts which he gives of its association 

 with V. solitarius seem to bear him out in this course. I deem it proper to 

 call attention to the matter, reserving an opinion until more material shall 

 have been examined. The points about the bird are its mucb duller and 

 more brownish olivaceous, with little contrast between the head and back, 

 impurity of the white loral line and orbital ring, together with a general 

 buffy or ocbraceous tinge of the under parts, where solitarius is pure white. 



