EASTERN GOLDEN-CROWNED KINGLET 387 



of heat, cold, and moisture. This primitive incubator was made of 

 the same fine, dark yellow-green moss, Hypnum uncinatum, that seems 

 characteristic of the habitations of the golden-crowned kinglet in this 

 locality, Usnea longissima, a long, fringelike lichen, and animal silk. 

 More of the gray-green Usnea lichen was used in the hammock-like 

 band around the middle of the nest than in other parts of the well- 

 made structure. The lining consisted of rabbit hair, I think, and 

 partridge feathers. The wall of the abode was all of an inch and a 

 half thick, and the window in the roof measured an inch and a half in 

 diameter." 



Nest-building starts early in Nova Scotia; Mr. Tufts tells me that 

 he found two nests just started on April 10, 1921. In order to deter- 

 mine how many nests the kinglets would build and how many eggs 

 they would lay, if the nests were destroyed, he tried the experiment 

 of taking three nests from each of two pairs in isolated groves. He 

 took the three sets from one pair on May 26, June 11, and June 30, 

 1915; and the other pair was robbed on May 27, June 15, and June 

 29, 1917. Each pair laid nine eggs each in the first two nests and 

 eight in the third. The third nest was a flimsy affair. The birds 

 must have worked fast to have built these nests and laid the large 

 sets of eggs in such short intervals. 



S. F. Blake (1916) found an interesting nest, in an unusual situa- 

 tion, near Stoughton, Mass., of which he says: 



My attention was first attracted by the familiar call-notes of the birds coming 

 from the edge of a rather close growth of Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana) and 

 deciduous trees at the base of a low hill close to a little-travelled wood-road. 

 Pushing in among the trees, I soon caught a glimpse of the female Kinglet being 

 pursued by a Black-and- White Warbler. The male soon came into view, and 

 very soon the female disappeared in the top of a red cedar about twenty feet 

 high. After a few minutes' wait I climbed a nearby tree and found her sitting 

 on the nest. This was placed 18 feet 10 inches above the ground on the upper 

 side of a small branch about a foot long, near the trunk and about a foot and a 

 half from the top of the tree, rather firmly fastened and requiring some effort 

 to dislodge. 



Eggs. — The golden-crowned kinglet lays large sets of its tiny eggs, 

 from five to ten in number, perhaps most often eight or nine. The 

 nest is so small that tbey have to be deposited in two layers, proba- 

 bly five in the lower and four in the upper layer in a set of nine; that 

 was the arrangement in one of Mr. Brewster's (1888) nests. His 

 description of the eggs is so good that I cannot improve upon it; of 

 the 18 eggs, he says: 



The majority are more or less regularly ovate, but several are elliptical-ovate 

 while two are very nearly perfectly elliptical-oval. The ground color varies 

 from creamy white to exceedingly deep, often somewhat muddy, cream color. 

 Over this light ground are sprinkled numerous markings of pale wood-brown, 

 while at least three specimens have a few spots and blotches of faint lavender. 



