Vol ^ XII "| Kennard and McKechnie, Broxvn Creeper. 1 85 



In October, 1879, appeared Mr. Wm. Brewster's most interest- 

 ing article on ' The Breeding Habits of the American Brown 

 Creeper,' 1 an article with which all the readers of 'The Auk' 

 should, if possible, be familiar before perusing the present paper. 

 In it Mr. Brewster describes very beautifully and at length, the 

 finding of a number of nests of this bird near Lake Umbagog, 

 Me., between May 31 and June 23, 1879. 



With the exception of the fact that the late Mr. Elwin A. 

 Capen of Canton, Mass., has told Mr. McKechnie of a pair of 

 these birds which spent one breeding season near his home in 

 the early 8o's but whose nest he had been unable to discover, 

 although he felt confident that it was somewhere in the vicinity, 

 there seems to be a lapse in the records of the breeding of the 

 Brown Creeper in eastern Massachusetts, till Dr. Arthur P. Chad- 

 bourne published a record 2 in which he tells of seeing Brown 

 Creepers in a swamp near Plymouth, Mass., during the months 

 of June and July. In speaking of the swamp he says, "in many 

 portions the original growth of huge white cedars (Cupressus 

 thyoides) and hemlock {Abies canadensis) have never been cut." 

 Afterwards, we believe, Dr. Chadbourne found these birds sup- 

 posedly breeding for several successive years, and on one occa- 

 sion found their nest which he photographed. 3 



The next record of the breeding of this bird in eastern Massa- 

 chusetts that we know of, and hitherto unpublished, has been sent 

 to us by Mr. Wm. Brewster, and will be cited by him in his forth- 

 coming 'Birds of the Cambridge Region of Massachusetts.' In it 

 Mr. Brewster states that "in 1898 a nest of the Brown Creeper 

 was found at Andover, Mass., by the late Mr. Howard S. Ford of 

 that place," who wrote him that "it was in a dead oak, placed 

 within a sneath of loose bark about four feet from the ground. 

 The tree stands in an oak grove which lies between cultivated 

 fields on the one hand, and an extensive swamp on the other." 



1 Bulletin of the Nuttall Ornithological Club, Vol. IV, October, 1879, 

 pp. 199-209. 



2 The Auk, Vol. XIII, October, 1896, p. 346. 



3 Since the above was written Dr. Chadbourne has sent an article to the 

 current number of ' The Auk ' giving a full and detailed account of this occur- 

 rence. 



