14 JUNE IN FRAN CON I A. 



and I were perfectly agreed while we had 

 the bird before us, and Mr. Brewster's tes- 

 timony is abundantly conclusive to the same 

 effect. He was in the Umbagog forests on 

 a special hunt for Philadelphia vireos (he 

 had collected specimens there on two previ- 

 ous occasions), and after some days of fruit- 

 less search discovered, almost by accident, 

 that the birds had all the while been singing 

 close about him, but in every instance had 

 passed for "nothing but red-eyes." 1 



For the benefit of the lay reader, I ought, 

 perhaps, to have explained before this that 

 the Philadelphia vireo is in coloration an ex- 

 act copy of the warbling vireo. There is a 

 slight difference in size between the two, 

 but the most practiced eye could not be de- 

 pended upon to tell them apart in a tree. 

 Vireo philadelphicus is in a peculiar case : 

 it looks like one common bird, and sings 

 like another. It might have been invented 

 on purpose to circumvent collectors, as the 

 Almighty has been supposed by some to 

 have created fossils on purpose to deceive 

 ungodly geologists. It is not surprising, 

 therefore, that the bird escaped the notice 



1 Bulletin oftheNuttall Ornithological Club, vol. v. p. 3. 



