316 BIRDS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



Avhich has been confounded with the following, remains with 

 us from May till September. • 



The Salt-water Marsh Wren, Troglodytes palustris, is 

 found on marshes and the borders of rivers near the sea, but 

 is not so common as the preceding. This bird is quick and 

 active in its motions, and in its song resembles the last de- 

 scribed. The nrst is formed of wet rushes twisted into each 

 other, and filled in with mud, in the shape of a cocoa-nut, 

 with an opening in the side. The eggs are from six to eight, 

 of a color approaching to mahogany. Nuttall thought that 

 this bird hardly ever came nearer than New York ; but Dr. 

 Storer has found its nest and egas at Barnstable in our State. 



The Winter Wren, Troglodytes hiemalis. is inserted in the 

 list of our birds, on the authority of Audubon. It abounds in 

 Maine in summer, but in this State it must be always rare. 



The Wood Wren, Troglodytes Americana, is a new spe- 

 cies, discovered by the same distinguished ornithologist, who 

 says that it is found in Massachusetts, though he cannot speak 

 with certainty of its summer haunts, nor of the extent of its 

 migrations. 



The Blue bird, Sialia Wilsonii, is a delightful messenger 

 of spring, whose early appearance makes us ask, " Hast thou 

 a star to guide thy path ?" since he comes before the fetters of 

 Orion are unbou\id, or the sweet influences of Pleiades have 

 begun to fall. He is said to resemble the English redbreast 

 so much in form and \iabits, as well as the tinge on his breast, 

 that he was called the blue-robin, by the first settlers of this 

 country. The first indication of spring brings the blue-bird, 

 and his sweet, but rather timid and tremulous note seems ex- 

 pressive of uncertainty, whether the season will permit him to 

 remain. He is often driven back by a relapse, as happened 

 in January of the last year, when he came on one or two fine 

 mornings, but was soon compelled to retreat. Every body 



