THE WRIGHT FLYCATCHER. 391 
were to be heard brisk Sewick’s in the precise fashion of eastern minimus; 
and at rarer intervals a more intense but still harsh and unresonant Szveé-chew. 
These observations were confirmed by the taking of several specimens; but 
elsewhere and in other seasons I have found the bird most unaccountably 
silent, and have been able to add little to its repertory of speech. 
In the summer of 1906 we found these Flycatchers preparing nests on 
Cannon Hill in Spokane. In both instances the birds were building out in the 
open after the fashion of the Western Wood Pewee (Jvyiochanes richard- 
som); one on the bare limb of a horse-chestnut tree some ten feet from the 
ground; the other upon an exposed elbow of a picturesque horizontal limb of 
a pine tree at a height of some sixty feet. Near Newport, in Stevens County, 
we located a nearly completed nest of this species on the 20th of May, and 
returned on the 1st of June to complete accounts. The nest was placed seven 
feet from the trunk of a tall fir tree, and at a height of forty feet. The bird 
was sitting, and when frightened dived headlong into the nearest thicket, 
where she skulked silently during our entire stay. The nest proved to bea 
delicate creation of the finest vegetable materials, weathered leaves, fibers, 
grasses, etc., carefully inwrought, and a considerable quantity of the orange- 
colored bracts of young fir trees. The lining was of hair, fine grass, bracts, 
and a single feather. In position the nest might well have been that of a 
Wood Pewee; but, altho it was deeply cupped, it was much broader, and so 
relatively flatter. The four fresh eggs which it contained were of a delicate 
cream-color, changing to pure white upon blowing. 
The Hammond Flycatcher was also found to be a common breeder in the 
valley of the Stehekin, where Mr. Bowles has taken several sets in very similar 
situations, viz., upon horizontal branches of fir trees at considerable heights. 
No. 151. 
WRIGHICS FLYCATCHER. 
A. O. U. No. 469. Empidonax wrightii Baird. 
Synonym.—LittLe GRAy FLYCATCHER. 
Description.—Adult (gray phase): Above dull bluish gray or faintly olivace- 
ous on back and sides; throat and breast pale gray to whitish with admixture of 
ill-concealed dusky; remaining parts, posteriorly, faintly tinged with pale prim- 
rose; a whitish eye-ring ; wing-markings, of the same pattern as in other species, 
or more extensive on secondaries and outer webs of tertials, definitely white; 
outer web of outermost rectrix pale whitish. Adult (yellow-bellied phase): As 
in gray phase, but underparts strongly tinged with yellow and upperparts faintly 
tinged with olive-green; wing-markings less purely white. Bill blackish above, 
