238 ORNITHOLOGY AND OOLOGY. 



attached to the sujiporting twigs, mixed with some slender strips of 

 fine bark and pine-leaves, and thickly bedded with the down of wil- 

 lows, the nankeen wool of the Virginia cotton-grass {Eriophorum 

 Virginicum), the down of fine stalks, the hair of the downy seeds 

 of the button-wood (Platamis), or the i^apus of compound flowers, 

 and then lined either with fine bent grass (Agrostis), or down, and 

 horsehair, and rarely with a few accidental feathers." 



The eggs are usually four in number, sometimes five : 

 they vary in color from creamy-white, with numerous spots 

 and blotches of different shades of brown, to a grayish-white 

 with a greenish tint, and marked with the same spots and 

 blotches ; these markings are thickest at the larger end of 

 the egg, where they are often confluent. Dimensions vary 

 from .67 by .50 inch to .64 by .50 inch. The habits of this 

 bird are well known ; and its genial nature and confid- 

 ing disposition have rendered it a great favorite with the 

 farmer. 



DENDROICA MACULOSA.— 5atV(f. 



The Black and Yellow Warbler ; Magnolia Warbler. 



Motacilla maculosa, Gmelin. Syst., I. (1788) 984. 



Sylvia maculosa, Nuttall. Man., L (1832) 370. Aud. Om. Biog., I. (1831) 260; 

 IL (1834) 145; V. (1839)458. 



Sylvia magnolia, Wilson. Am. Om., IIL (1811) 63. 



Description. 



Male, in spring. — Bill dark bluish-black, rather lighter beneath; tail dusky; 

 top of head light grayish-blue; front, lore, cheek, and a stripe under the eye, black, 

 running into a large triangular patch on the back, between the wings, which is also 

 black ; eyelids and a stripe from the eye along the head white ; upper tail coverts 

 black, some of the feathers tipped with grayish; abdomen and lower tail coverts 

 white; rump and under parts, except as described, j'ellow; lower throat, breast, and 

 sides streaked with black, the streaks closer on the lower throat and fore breast; 

 lesser wing coverts, and edges of the wing and tail, bluish-gray, the former spotted 

 with black; quills and tail almost black, the latter with a square patch of white on 

 the inner webs of all the tail feathers (but the two inner), beyond the middle of the 

 tail; two white bands across the wings (sometimes coalesced into one), formed by 

 the small coverts and secondaries ; part of the edge of the inner webs of the quills 

 white; feathers margining the black patch on the back behind and on the sides 

 tinged with greenish. 



Second and third quills longest, first shorter than fourth ; tail rounded, emarginate. 



Female, in spring. — In general appearance like the male, but with the corre- 

 sponding colors much duller; the black on the back reduced to a few large proxi- 



