74 LIFE-HISTORIES OF BIRDS 



strobi* Donacia confine nta* among the former ; and. 

 M-usca dottiest ica and Tabanits litieola, among the latter. 



Mr. Paine says this species always nidificates in low alder- 

 hushes by running streams, and never higher than three 

 or four feet from the ground. Mr. Brewster met it 

 breeding at the base of Mt. Washington, in the Glens, in 

 August, 1869; and in Xewrv Township, Maine, in June. 

 1871 ; but has placed no description of its nest upon record 

 so far as we are aware. 



Dr. Brewer has found this species breeding on the banks 

 of the Androscoggin and Peabody Rivers, in Gorham. The 

 nests were all placed in similar situations, and bore a close 

 resemblance in structure to the nests of Cvanospiza cvanea. 

 They were composed of dry grasses and fine strips of bark, 

 exteriorly ; and were lined with fine grass-stems. The same 

 distinguished writer has observed its nests among the foot- 

 hills at the base of Mt. Washington, whose wooded sides 

 were covered with snow to the depth of several feet. 



Mr. Kennicott procured a nest, July o,, at Fort Resolution. 

 which was built in a small spruce in the midst of a thick clus- 

 ter of low. bushes, at an elevation of three feet above the 

 ground. The female was killed upon the nest. The latter 

 contained two young birds and two eggs. 



Mr. H. W. Henshaw, in the "Quarterly Bulletin of the 

 Nuttall Ornithological Club," for April, describes a typical 

 nest which was taken near Columbus, Ohio, by Dr. Wheaton. 

 This structure resembled that of Dendrceca cestiva, but lack- 

 ed its neatness and compactness. Exteriorly, this nest was 

 built of hempen fibres, and was lined with fine grasses and 

 an admixture of thistle-down. It was placed in an upright 

 fork, and was surrounded by small twigs, to which it was 

 firmly secured by stringy fibres. Dr. Henshaw ascribes this 

 particular position as common to all the nests which he has 

 observed of this species, as well as to those of pnsi?/ns in 

 the west. 



According to Mr. H. A. Purdie, of Boston, the nest, its 



