AMERttlAN WARBLEftS. 93 



Comparisons. This is the only warbler which we have without wing 

 bands and tail spots, that has a bluish head, greenish back .and yellow un>- 

 der parts. 



Nests and Eggs. -Xests> placed on the ground, composed of moss^ 

 grasses, strips of bark etc. and lined with finer grasses and sometimes hair. 

 Eggs, four or five in number, oval, varying from white to creamy, finely 

 spotted and dotted, often more thickly on the larger end, with brown of 

 Varying shades and lilac, dimensions, .62 by .50. 



General Habits. The Nashville Warblers are fairly com' 

 mon during migration in Massachusetts, at which time they 

 may be found almost anywhere in woodlands, especially along 

 their borders, or they will sometimes visit orchards and hedge- 

 rows at this time. During summer, when they are less com- 

 mon, and rather local in distribution, these warblers are fond 

 of open places in woodlands, or they may be found on the out* 

 skirts of woods. They will return year after year to a favorite 

 spot. I knew^ several such spots in past years, and never failed 

 to find the birds there, but of late years so many changes have 

 been made by cutting away the timber that the warblers have 

 been driven away in many cases. As an example, however, of 

 the persistency with which these birds cling to a chosen spot 

 I can point to a certain cup-like hollow among the hills in Wave- 

 edy. This little valley is overgrown with birches on its sides, 

 and lower, where a stream flows through, are alders. Higher 

 nearer the hill tops, are a few larger trees that rise above the 

 others. On some one of these trees any day in summer I can 

 find a Nashville Warbler, and I have found either the same 

 birds or their ancestors on the same trees every summer for 

 nearly forty years. The reason for this continuous occupation 

 on the part of the birds is due to the fact that the changes 

 which have occured in this immediate vicinity have been grad* 

 iial, in other words> natural changes. When I first knew the 

 little valley it was an open pasture, in which grew a few scatter* 

 ing huckleberry bushes, among which, later, sprang up the 

 gray birches which are now there. The Nashvilles have paid no 



