278 NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 



plantagineum. He describes tlie eggs as having a white ground, sharp at one 

 end, and marked with spots of lihic-purple and of two shades of brown, 

 more numerous at the larger end, where they formed a ring. He speaks of 

 their note as slender, and noticed their arrival about the second week of 

 May, leaving the middle of September. 



At another time Mr. Nuttall was attracted by the slender, filing notes of 

 this bird, resembling the suppressed syllables 'tsh-tsh-tsh-tshca, beginning 

 low and gradually growing louder. With its mate it was busily engaged 

 collecting flies and larvae about a clump of locust-trees in Mount Auburn. 

 Their nest was near, and the female, without any precautions, went directly 

 to it. Mr. Nuttall removed two eggs, which he afterwards replaced. Each 

 time, on his withdrawal, she returned to the nest, and resorted to no expedi- 

 ents to entice him away. 



Several nests of this Warbler have been obtained by Mr. Welch in Lynn. 

 One was built on a wild rose, only a few feet from the ground. It is a snug, 

 compact, and elaborately woven structure, having a height and a diameter of 

 about two and a half inches. The cavity is two inches wide and one and a 

 half deep. The materials of whicli the outer parts are woven are chiefly the 

 soft inner bark of small shrubs, mingled with dry rose-leaves, bits of vege- 

 tables, wood, woody fibres, decayed stems of plants, spiders' webs, etc. The 

 whole is bound together like a web by cotton-like fibres of a vegetaljle ori- 

 gin. The upper rim of this nest is a marked feature, being a strongly inter- ■ 

 laced weaving of vegetable roots and strips of bark. The lining of the nest 

 is composed of fine vegetable fibres and a few horse-hairs. This nest, in its 

 general mode of construction, resembles all that I have seen ; only in others 

 the materials vary, — in some dead and decayed leaves, in others remains 

 of old cocoons, and in others the pappus of composite plants, being more 

 prominent than the fine strips of bark. The nests are usually within four 

 feet of the ground. The eggs vary from three to five, and even six. 



The late Dr. Gerhardt found this bird the most common Warbler in Nor- 

 thern Georgia. There its nests were similar in size, structure, and position, 

 but differed more or less in the materials of which they were made. The 

 nests were a trifle larger and the walls thinner, the cavities being correspond- 

 ingly larger. The materials were more invariably fine strips of inner bark 

 and flax-like vegetable fibres, and were lined with the finest stems of plants, 

 in one case witii the feathers of the Great Horned Owl. In that neighbor- 

 hood the eggs were deposited by the lotli of IMay. 



In Massacliusetts the Prairie Warbler invariably selects wild pasture-land, 

 often not far from villages, and always open or xery thinly wooded. Iii 

 Georgia their nests were built in almost every kind of bush or low tree, or 

 on the lower limbs of post-oaks, at the height of from four to seven feet. 

 Eggs were found once as early as the 2d of May, and once as late as the lOtli 

 of June. The birds arrived there by the 10th of April, and seemed to' 

 prefer hillsides, but were found in almost any open locality. 



