62 THE BIRDS ABOUT Us. 



minutes while it gleaned the visible insects of a tall 

 tulip-tree. 



A splendid representative of the warblers that re- 

 mains all summer in the Middle States, and sings 

 rather than splutters over squeaky efforts at melody, 

 is the Maryland Yellow-throat. 



Given a piece of marshy ground, with an abun- 

 dance of skunk-cabbage and a fairly dense growth 



of saplings, and near 

 by a tangle of green- 

 brier and blackberry, 

 and you will be pretty 

 sure to have it ten- 

 anted by a pair of 

 yellow-throats. If 

 Redstart - they are there you 



will quickly know it, even if you do not see them, 

 for they are forever tswee-tee-tee, tswee-tee-tee-tee\wg, 

 or, changing their tune, ask, in sweetly-warbled words, 

 " Where did you get it ?" 



The yellow-throat has grown bolder since Wilson's 

 day, and now some modifications are called for in the 

 following by that author : 



" This is one of the humble inhabitants of briers, brambles, alder- 

 bushes, and such shrubbery as grows most luxuriantly in low watery 

 situations, and might with propriety be denominated Humility, its 

 business or ambition seldom leading it higher than the tops of the 

 underwood. Insects and their larvae are its usual food. It dives 

 into the deepest of the thicket, rambles among the roots, searches 

 round the stems, examines both sides of the leaf, raising itself on its 

 legs so as to peep into every crevice ; amusing itself at times with a 

 very simple, and not disagreeable, song." 



If you happen to disturb the nest the " humility" 



