ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. 79 



young, attended by the parents, the third week in August, 1876, 

 on Mount Monadnock, New Hampshire, which he has no doubt 

 were hatched in the immediate vicinity. Mr. J. K. Lord states that 

 these birds were abundant on Vancouver's Island and the adjacent 

 coast, where he found them building pensile nests suspended from 

 the tips of high pine branches, in which they laid from five to seven 

 eggs. He does not describe the eggs, which was hardly to be ex- 

 pected, perhaps, considering the half-use he seems to have made of 

 his opportunities. 



Herr F. W. Baedeker has figured the egg in the " Journal fur 

 Ornithologie " (1856, p. 33, PI. I, Fig. 8), and also in his large work 

 on the eggs of the birds of Europe. Dr. Coues observes, in a pri- 

 vate communication to me, " The plate indicates a rather roundish 

 egg, though the two specimens figured differ noticeably in size and 

 shape ; they are spoken of in the text as ' niedliche kleine Eirchen 

 mit lehmgelben ben Flekschen auf weissen Grunde,' and compared 

 with those of other species illustrated on the same plate." 



Begulus cuvieri, described by Audubon from a specimen taken 

 near the banks of the Sohuylkill River, has remained unknown to 

 ornithologists ever since. 



NESTING HABITS OF THE CALIFORNIAN HOUSE WREN 

 (TROGLODYTES AEDON VAR. PARKMANNI). 



BY DR. J. G. COOPER. 



The little fellows who require such a triple scientific name, ac- 

 cording to the latest fashion in nomenclature, have this year ex- 

 hibited in my garden a remarkable characteristic or habit, which, 

 if not confined to the western l-ace, has never been recorded of those 

 individuals found in the northeastern section of the Union, though 

 it may be looked for in the longer summers of the southei'n and 

 interior States. 



The well-known fact that during the season of incubation the 

 males usually busy themselves in building several nests in places 

 where they seem quite unnecessary, has always been attributed to 

 a sort of whim or desire for occupation, or to a judicious foresight ; 

 providing thus against a possible destruction of the first nest. 



