RED-BACKED WARBLER. 159 



branches of the same trees. At this time, the 

 ovary was scarcely developed, the ova being dis- 

 tinguishable only with a lens. The stomach, in 

 each case, was filled with a black mass of insects. 



RED-BACKED WARBLER.* 

 Prairie Warbler. — WiLS. 



Sylvicola discolor. 



Sylvia discolor, Vieill. — Aud. pi. 14, 

 Sylvia mifiuta, WiLS. 



It is before the fierce heat of summer has 

 begun to abate in the prairies of the west, that 

 this little bird seeks its winter quarters. On the 

 18th of August I first met with it, on which day I 

 shot two in different localities. One was hopping 

 hurriedly about low bushes, and herbaceous weeds, 

 not a foot from the ground, examining every stalk 

 and twig, as it proceeded regularly but rapidly 

 along the road-side, for insects. The other was 

 differently engaged. It flew from a bush by the 

 way-side as far as the middle of the road, when 

 hovering in the air a few feet from the ground, it 

 fluttered and turned hither and thither, and then 

 flew back to nearly the same spot as that whence it 

 had started. In a second or two it performed exactly 

 the same manoeuvres again ; and then a third time, 



* Length 4f inches, expanse 7, flexure 2^, tail 1^, rictus ii, tarsus 

 ■J, middle toe ^. 



