VoLXVIII-l General Notes. Ill 



1901 J *. * J. 



chopped meat, nor crumbs nor meal. Wishing to ascertain its indentity 

 exactly, I whistled the well-known " tvichity -wichity " tune of the Mary- 

 land Yellow-throat {Geoiklypis trichas). On hearing this tune, the bird 

 though fully 50 feet awaj-, flew toward me almost without hesitation till 

 it perched within four feet of my lips. Having eyed me seriously for a 

 while it withdrew to a little distance and soon lost interest in my whistling. 

 Thus identified, the bird must have been the Maryland Yellow-throat 

 — a male in fall plumage, a dress which in any case I think I know accu- 

 rately. Now the interest of this occurrence lies in the fact that the posi- 

 tion of the ship (and the matter grew hourly worse while the bird staid 

 aboard) was well to the eastward of a line drawn from Nova Scotia to any 

 land on this side of the Atlantic, even Bermuda. And I do not suppose 

 these warblers migrate direct from Newfoundland to Bermuda nor the 

 West Indies. There had been no noticeable hard weather; the migrant 

 was fresh ; and I must conclude (with Mr. Brewster) that my Yellow- 

 throat was a lost bird. It would be well to record all such instances of 

 sheer error in migration. In this case the only point in doubt would be 

 w^hether it wasayoung bird in its first attempt. — Reginald C. Robbins, 

 Boston^ Mass. 



The Breeding of the Hermit Thursh on Martha's Vineyard Island. — 



Mr. H. V. Greenough took on July 27, 1900, a female Hermit Thrush 

 {Hylocichla guttata fallasii) near Tashmoo Lake, West Chop, Martha's 

 Vineyard, Mass. The bird was heard singing, and a number of others of 

 its kind were seen, evidently of one family. The bird taken is in very 

 worn breeding plumage. This is the first breeding record I believe for 

 this island. — Reginald Heber Howe, Jr., Longxvood, Mass. 



The Hermit Thrush on Martha's Vineyard, Mass. — Apropos of Mr. 

 Reginald Heber Howe's record of the Hermit Thrush on Martha's Vine- 

 yard the following may be of interest. In a list of birds read before the 

 Delaware Valley Ornithological Club, Feb. 2, 1899, the writer gave the 

 Hermit Thrush as a summer resident on Martha's Vineyard. My first 

 experience with this bird was in August, 1897, while camping on the 

 western shore of Lake Tashmoo, a small brackish pond in the northern 

 part of the island. Our camp was situated upon a small promontory 

 which projects into the lake for about one hundred yards. Extending 

 between this point and the shore is a cove-shaped marsh covered with 

 sphagnum and freshened by numerous springs. On the side of the 

 marsh near the shore the bank ascends abruptly for eight or ten feet and 

 then slopes gradually back, at no place reaching a height of fiftj' feet. 

 Covering the point and extending half a mile back from the shore is a 

 grove of yellow pines. Here and there they have been cleared away, 

 giving place to an undergrowth of bay, high bush huckleberry, and vari- 

 ous species of oak. Further back from the shore the pines have so inter- 

 grown as to make it almost impere*rable. Bordering on these is an oak 



