[1885. Brewster on Stvainson's Warbler. 6c 



at a distance of sixteen and one-half miles. The keeper of this 

 light, Mr. William Marshall, has been there seven years. He 

 states that during the migrations, in misty and rainy nights, large 

 numbers of birds strike. On a single morning he has picked up 

 one hundred and fifty on the pier surrounding the tower, and 

 thinks that ten times as many as lodge on this narrow plat- 

 form fall into the water. A package of specimens which he was 

 kind enough to send the Committee for identification, early in 

 June last, contained the following species : Regulus calendula 

 ( $ ) , Dendroeca castanea ( 9 ) > Dendroeca maculosa ( J 1 and 

 9). Dendroeca ccerulescens {$ and 2 9), Geothlypis trichas 

 (2 $ and 9), Geothlypis Philadelphia (9). Helminthopkila 

 peregrina (<£), Myiodioctes canadensis {$), Siurus aurica- 

 pillits, Vireo philadelphicus (3), Vireo solitarius, Vireo 

 olivaceits. Zonotrichia albicollis (2), Zonotrichia leucophrys 

 ( J 1 ) , Passerculus savanna^ Melospiza lincolni, Contopus 

 virens, Etnpidonax Jlaviventris (2). 



Mr. James Davenport, keeper of the light atMcGulpin's Point, 

 near the western entrance of the Straits of Mackinac, has also 

 furnished the Committee with valuable information. 



SWAINSON'S WARBLER. 



BY WILLIAM BREWSTER. 



Swainsox's Warbler was discovered in 1S32 near Charles- 

 ton, .South Carolina, by the Rev. John Bachman. His experi- 

 ence, as quoted by Audubon — who named the species and made 

 it the type of a genus Helinaia — is as follows:* "I was first 

 attracted by the novelty of its notes, four or five in number, repeat- 

 ed at intervals of five or six minutes apart. These notes were 

 loud, clear, and more like a whistle than a song. They resembled 

 the sounds of some extraordinary ventriloquist in such a degree, 

 that I supposed the bird much farther from me than it really 

 was ; for after some trouble caused by these fictitious notes, I 

 perceived it near to me, and soon shot it. 



* Birds of America, Vol. II, p. 84. 



