JOURNAT^ OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 5 



young birds. They appeared to be all of seven days old, and had a 

 lazy way of lying very still, as if a motion on their part might spill 

 them out of the nest. More cheerful, wise looking little birds I 

 never saw. 



The second nest was not more than a foot above the ground, a 

 very substantial affair, with thick walls. In this case it was placed 

 on a number of crossing, horizontal stems of dead meadow sweet 

 bushes, with a few twigs, perhaps one-sixteenth of an inch in 

 diameter, ascending to form a crotch. The foundation was a 

 cushion of coarse, soft, gray grasses. On this yielding mass was 

 formed a saucer-shaped nest of fine gray hay, with a beautifully 

 turned brim. The lining consisted of fine yellow hay, horse hair, 

 and a black hair-like vegetable fibre. The whole was anchored to 

 the surrounding twigs with spider's silk. 



If one of the parent birds sighted me from the telegraph wire 

 as I passed the swale where they nested, it immediately dropped 

 into an alder thicket and began to chirp. Here it was joined by the 

 mate. They both continued to fret as long as I was within hearing. 

 If I concealed myself in the alders near the nest, they did not 

 hesitate to take up their stand within a few yards of me, but usually 

 out of sight, and scold while I remained. 



The sixth morning that I called on the Flycatcher, two little 

 birds were out of the nest, one on the edge, the last in it. The one 

 on the edge of the nest flew to my finger, the one in it snuggled 

 down in my lap. After looking in my face a few instants they 

 hopped to the near-by branches. 



Reprint of Some of the Ornithological Papers of 

 Sylvester B. Beckett. 



By A. H. Norton. 

 (Concluded from page 103, VoL XI.) 



But the favorite of all the Sparrows, indeed of the whole Finch 

 family, with the speaker was the White-throated Sparrow {Frin^illa 

 pennsylvanica) . He had seldom seen it here till along the first of 



