30 JVESTS AND EGGS OF BIRDS. 



inner diameter of the nest is about three inches, with a depth 

 of two inches. Taking it altogether it is not very artistically con- 

 structed. None of the nests were more than three feet from the 

 gi^ound. In two cases, I found nests in a dense bushy thicket of 

 wild currant, twice again in willow bushes, and in another in- 

 stance in an iron-wood bush." A nest found by Dr. E. Palmer, 

 in southern Utah, June S, was similar, but a little larger. 



The usual number of eggs, strangely, is only two, and lay- 

 ing begins about the middle of March. The eggs are some- 

 what elongated in shape, with a tendency to be pointed at the 

 smaller end; an average measurement makes them l.io inches 

 long by .82 of an inch broad. In color they are perfect, im- 

 maculate, robin-green and, in the total absence of markings, 

 differ remarkably from all other members of this genus. Three 

 broods are said to be raised and the young are fed on insects. 



Family SAXICOLID^ — Stone-chats. 



• 15. THE ^WHEAT-EAR. 



SAXICOLA CENANTHE Bcchstcin. 



Stone-chat; 'White-ruinp ; 'White-tail; Fallow-smack; Chacker; Chack-bird; 

 Clodhopper; etc., etc. (Great Britiau.) 



This bird is a straggler from the British Isles., where in many 

 districts it is commonly and familiarly known. The nest, some- 

 times very neat and well-constructed, is formed of moss and ben- 

 ty grass, and lined with hair, feathers, fine grass-stalks, etc., 

 is often quite on the ground and with no bush near ; sometimes 

 at the foot of a low bush, or in the bush itself, or in the crevice 

 of an old wall, but very near the ground. It is thus often hard 

 to find. The eggs are five or six, of a pale blue-green ground, 

 very sparingly freckled with dull reddish-brown, and chiefly near 

 the large end, where a zone is sometimes formed. Although 

 it has been proved, pretty satisfactorily, to nestle casually in 

 Labrador and Greenland, the bird hardly comes suflSciently into 

 our scope to merit a long description. 



