lal le 
ek ted 
* 
VIREONID®, VIREOS.—GEN. 53. 119 
continent, and several of them are abundant birds of the Atlantic States, inhabit- 
ing woodland and shrubbery. They are exclusively insectivorous, and are therefore 
necessarily migratory in our latitudes. They build a neat pensile nest in the fork 
of a branchlet, and commonly lay four or five white speckled eggs. Next after the 
warblers, the greenlets are the most delightful of our forest birds, though their 
charms address the ear and not the eye. Clad in simple tints that harmonize with 
the verdure, these gentle songsters warble their lays unseen, while the foliage itself 
seems stirred to music. In the quaint and curious ditty of the white-eye —in the 
earnest, voluble strains of the red-eye —in the tender secret that the warbling vireo 
‘confides in whispers to the passing breeze — he is insensible, who does not hear the 
echo of thoughts he never clothes in words. 
ANALYSIS OF SPECIES. 
Primaries apparently 9 (the Ist rudimentary and displaced). (a) 
Primaries evidently 10 (the 1st short or Seas (b) 
(a) Throat yellow,.. . e el ls s) fe ey” (0) 1s) a ROEUEYT ONS 
— white; crown aan mee nlacke edger, ipandiy Conbrastine with back, ... . . philadelphicus. 
—black-edged, back olive; no maxillary streaks, . . . . . . olivaceus. 
—maxillary streaks, . .. . . barbatulus. 
(b) Crown black,. .... CMeaMey Acie kcaifenrts) Unkseal te" Jeli Net ae wees) sche se (GLICO DOI 
—not black; spurious Fomul a leant ¥ aslongas 2nd and wing 2}long, . .... . . . vicinior. 
—not as long as 2nd, or wing not 2} long (c) 
(c) Wing-bands wanting: coloration as in philadelphicus, . . . Si at (al Mp) ane UCD ELS 
—present; length over 5in.; back olive, contrasting with ashy fpyire crown, . . . solitarius. 
—plumbeous, crown scarcely different, . . . . plumbeus. 
—5in. or less; wing =tail, both about 2}; Ist quill=42nd., .. . . pusillus. 
—> tail; crown ashy, chin and supere. line white, . . belli. 
— olive, chin wht., superc. line yell., . novebor. 
—and under parts yell’sh, . huttonii. 
Oxzs. The Bartramian Vireo of Aun., Orn. Biog. v, 296, pl. 434, f. 4; 
B. Am. iv, 153, pl. 242, and of Nurr., i, 2d ed. 358, has not been identified by 
later ornithologists; but there is little chance of its being a good species. The 
descriptions indicate a bird much like V. olivacews. The original Vireo bartramii of 
Swainson, Fauna Bor.-Am. ii, 235, is a Brazilian species of the olivacews group, 
wrongly ascribed to North America. The name Vireo virescens that Barrp applied 
to the Bartramian Vireo, in B. N. A. p. 333, is doubtless an erroneous identification, 
as he has since shown, VreItLLov’s virescens being based on a Pennsylvania speci- 
men, almost certainly olivacews.— For the discussion of these questions, and 
a masterly review of the whole genus, see Barrp, Review, pp. 322-370. 
Fic.59. Red-eyed Vireo. (This, and subsequent figs. of this family, of nat. size.) 
Red-eyed Vireo. Above, olive-green; crown ash, edged on each side 
with a blackish line, below this a white superciliary line, below this again a 
dusky stripe through eye; under parts white, faintly shaded with olive 
along sides, and tinged with olive on under wing and tail-coverts; wings 
and tail dusky, edged with olive outside, with whitish inside ; bill dusky, pale 
