TROGLODYTID.E — THE WRENS. 157 



he was examining them. The nest was seven inches in length and four and a 

 half in breadth. Its walls were composed of mosses and lichens, and were 

 nearly two inches in thickness. The cavity was very warmly lined with the 

 fur of the American hare and a few soft feathers. Another nest found on 

 the Mohawk, in New York, was similar, but smaller, and built against the 

 side of a rock near its bottom. 



Mr. William F. Hall met with the nest and eggs of this bird at Camp 

 Sebois in the central eastern portion of Maine. It was built in an unoccupied 

 log-hut, among the fir-leaves and mosses in a crevice between the logs. It 

 was large and bulky, composed externally of mosses and lined with the fur 

 of hedge-hogs, and the feathers of the spruce partridge and other birds. It 

 was in the shape of a pouch, and the entrance was neatly framed with fine 

 pine sticks. The eggs were six in number, and somewhat resembled those of 

 the Farus atricapillns. The female was seen and fully identified. 



In this nest, which measured five and three quarters inches by five in 

 breadth, the size, solidity, and strength, in view of the diminutive proportions 

 of its tiny architect, are quite remarkable. The walls were two inches in, 

 thickness and very strongly impacted and interw^oven. The cavity was an 

 inch and a quarter wide and four inches deep. Its hemlock framework had 

 been made of green materials, and their strong and agreeable odor pervaded 

 the structure. The eggs measured .65 by .48 of an inch, and were spotted 

 with a bright reddish-brown and a few pale markings of purplish-slate, on a 

 pure white ground. Compared with the eggs of the European Wren their 

 eggs are larger, less oval in shape, and the spots much more marked in 

 their character and distinctness. 



Troglodytes parvulus, var. alascensis, Baikd. 



ALASKA WREN. 



Troglodytes alascensis, Baird, Trans. Chicago Acad. Sc. I, ii, 315, pi. xxx, fig. 3, 1869. — 

 Dall & Bannister (Alaska). — Friesch, Ornith. N. W. Amerikas, 1872, 30. 



Sp. Char. $ ad., 61,329, Amaknak Island, Unalaschka, Oct. 21, 1871 ; W. H. Dall. 

 Above umber-brown, more rufescent on the wings, rump, and tail ; secondaries and tail- 

 feathers showing indistinct transverse dusky bars ; primaries about equally barred with 

 blackish and dilute umber or brownish-vs^hite ; middle-coverts tipped with a small white 

 dot, preceded by a black one. Lower part, including a rather distinct superciliary stripe, 

 pale ochraceous-umber ; sides, flanks, abdomen, and crissum distinctly barred w\\h dusky 

 and whitish on a rusty ground ; crissum with sagittate spots of white. Wing, 2.20 ; tail, 

 1.60; culmen, .65; tarsus, .75. 



Hab. Aleutian and Pribylow Islands, Alaska. 



The specimen above described represents about the average of a large 

 series obtained on Amaknak Island by Mr. Dall. They vary somewhat 

 among themselves as regards dimensions, l3ut all are very much larger than 



