jSgi-] Bkkwsti'.k o)/ /:,i</iiii(iii's IVuih/rr. 



151 



however, was directly contrary to this, for we found it oftenest on 

 hottoni hinds where tlie forests, although composed of _<^rand ohl 

 trees thickly hung with Spanish moss, were rarely dense or tan- 

 gled, the ground being nearly or quite free from undergrowth and 

 either muddy with pools of stagnant water or carpeted with dry 

 leaves. The bird, moreover, not only frequented the tops of the 

 tallest trees, but at all times of the day and under every condition of 

 weather kept at a greater average height than any other Warbler 

 excepting Dendroica dominica. In its marked preference for 

 cypresses it also resembled the species just named, but unlike it 

 was never seen in pines. It was usually met with on or very near 

 the banks of the river or its tributary creeks, but this mav have 

 been due to the fact that we found paddling a light canoe so much 

 more agreeable and expeditious than walking that we seldom went 

 far from the attractive and convenient waterways with which the 

 region abounded. 



The habit of keeping high in the trees was not, on the part of 

 our Warbler, wholly without exceptions — which will be given 

 later. But what species is so strictly arboreal as never to ap- 

 proach the ground.? Under certain contlitions birds often turn up 

 in strange and unexpected places. Especially true is this of the 

 season of migration. I remember starting a Carolina Rail and a 

 Bittern at the same moment in a patch of beach grass on the 

 sand-hills at Swampscott, Massachusetts, and on another occasion, 

 in a similar place at Nantucket, I killed a Gray-cheeked Thrush, a 

 Connecticut Warbler, and a Tennessee Warbler in the course of a 

 few minutes ; while it is not unusual, in early autumn, to find 

 such tree-loving species as Red-bellied Nuthatches and even 

 Brown Creepers feeding among rocks on barren points or islands 

 along the seacoast. In view of these considerations there now 

 seem reasons for suspecting that when, as at Key West, Bach- 

 man's Warbler has occurred numerously in thickets or low scrub, 

 this has been due, not to a preference for such cover, but simply 

 to the fact that no better shelter was available during a necessary 

 halt in a long journey, and that its favorite haunts are lofty tree tops. 



It would be possible, of course, to argue on the other side of the 

 question and to suggest that the conditions which existed during 

 our visit to the Suwanee were peculiar. Thus it may be that the 

 tender young foliage of the great cypresses furnished an excep- 



