BIRDS OF MINNESOTA. 249 



above the ground. It contained five creamy-white eggs, spotted 

 with two shades of reddish-brown, more pronounced about the 

 larger end, and averaging in measurements, .85 by .65 of an 

 inch. I omitted to say that the nest had but a very superficial ex- 

 cavation, leaving the form of the occupant very much as if 

 squatted on, and not in it. Owing to the breeding habits tak- 

 ing them to such deep shade, these denizens of the forest are 

 rarely seen by any but systematic observers who know some- 

 thing about them. I see no reason to doubt their uniform dis- 

 tribution over the timbered sections of the entire State, but it 

 is not a little remarkable that they have never been reported 

 to me from but one locality, and then by a little boy in the Big 

 Woods, who sent me the bird and insisted that he could get the 

 eggs for me, but he never did. 



Their food in most respects, is like that of the other Ply- 

 catchers, consisting largely of larvae during the rearing of 

 the young birds. 



They leave the country in the autumn from the first to the 

 tenth of September. 



SPECIFIC CHARACTERS. 



Wings long, much pointed; the second quill longest; the 

 first longer than the third; tail deeply forked; tarsi short; 

 the upper parts ashy-brown, showing darker brown centres of 

 the feathers; this is eminently the case on the top of the head; 

 the sides of the head and neck, of the breast and body, res- 

 embling the back, but with the edges of the feathers tinged 

 with gray, leaving a darker central streak; the chin, throat, 

 narrow line down the middle of the breast and body, abdomen, 

 and lower tail coverts, white, or sometimes with a faint tinge 

 of yellow; the lower tail coverts somewhat streaked with 

 brown in the center; on each side of the rump, generally con- 

 cealed by the wings is an elongated bunch of white silky 

 feathers; the wings and tail a very dark brown, the former 

 with the edges of the secondaries and tertials edged with dull 

 white; the lower wing coverts and axillaries grayish-brown; 

 the tips of the primaries and tail feathers rather paler; feet 

 and upper mandibles black, lower mandible brown; the young 

 of the year similar, but the color duller; the feet light-brown. 



Length, 7.50; wing, 4.33; tail, 3.30; tarsus, 0.6. 



Habitat, North America, breeding from the northern and the 

 higher mountainous parts of the United States northward. In 

 winter, south to Central America and Columbia. 



