56 PROTHONOTARY WARBLER 



28, 1888, and August 8, 1889. The earliest records south of the 

 United States are on the coast of southeastern Nicaragua, September 

 2, 1892, and in northern Colombia, South America, September 25. 

 The latest date at Raleigh, N. C, is August 26, and at Omaha, Nebr., 

 August 25 to September 10. The latest Florida record is of a bird 

 that struck the light at Sombrero Key, September 25, 1888, and the 

 latest from New Orleans is September 24, 1893. The only fall record 

 for the West Indies is of one taken at New Providence, Bahamas, 

 August 28, 1898. 



The route of the Prothonotary Warbler in its fall migration is 

 interesting; the breeding birds of the Middle Atlantic States appar- 

 ently pass southwest to northwestern Florida and then take a 

 seven-hundred-mile flight directly across the Gulf of Mexico to 

 southern Yucatan, instead of crossing to Cuba and thence to Yucatan. 



The Bird and its Haunts. The charm of its haunts and the 

 beauty of its plumage combine to render the Prothonotary Warbler 

 among the most attractive members of this family. I clearly recall 

 my own first meeting with it in the Suwanee River region of Florida. 

 Quietly paddling my canoe along one of the many enchanting, and, 

 I was then quite willing to believe, enchanted streams which flowed 

 through the forests into the main river, this glowing bit of bird-life 

 gleamed like a torch in the night. No neck-straining examination 

 with opera-glass pointed to the tree-tops, was required to determine 

 his identity, as, flitting from bush to bush along the river's bank, his 

 golden plumes were displayed as though for my special benefit. 



If all our Warblers had received the attention which the Pro- 

 thonotary's attractions have won for him, the preparation of this 

 volume would have been a much easier and more satisfactory task. 

 Space, indeed, prohibits adequate quotations from the monographs 

 of which this bird has been the subject, and for more detailed infor- 

 mation than can here well be presented, the student is referred to the 

 papers cited beyond. From the one by William Brewster 1 , the follow- 

 ing admirable pen picture of the Prothonotary and its haunts is 

 extracted : 



In the heavily timbered bottoms of the Wabash and White 

 Rivers, Brewster writes, two things were found to be essential to the 

 Prothonotary's presence, "namely, an abundance of willows and the 

 immediate proximity of water. Thickets of button bushes did indeed 

 satisfy a few scattered and perhaps not over particular individuals 

 and pairs, but away from water they never were seen. So marked 



