SPECIES 26. SYLVIA MINUTE. 

 PRAIRIE WARBLER. 



[Plate XXV. Fig. 4.] 

 PEALE'S Museum, No. 7784. 



THIS pretty little species I first discovered in that singular 

 tract of country in Kentucky, commonly called the Barrens. I 

 shot several afterwards in the open woods of the Chactaw na- 

 tion, where they were more numerous. They seem to prefer 

 these open plains, and thinly wooded tracts; and have this sin- 

 gularity in their manners, that they are not easily alarmed ; and 

 search among the leaves the most leisurely of any of the tribe 

 I have yet met with; seeming to examine every blade of grass, 

 and every leaf; uttering at short intervals a feeble chirr. I 

 have observed one of these birds to sit on the lower branch of a 

 tree for half an hour at a time, and allow me to come up nearly 

 to the foot of the tree, without seeming to be in the least dis- 

 turbed, or to discontinue the regularity of its occasional note. 

 In activity it is the reverse of the preceding species; and is 

 rather a scarce bird in the countries where I found it. Its food 

 consists principally of small caterpillars and winged insects. 



The Prairie Warbler is four inches and a half long, and six 

 inches and a half in extent; the upper parts are olive, spotted 

 on the back with reddish chestnut; from the nostril over and 

 under the eye, yellow; lores black; a broad streak of black also 

 passes beneath the yellow under the eye; small pointed spots of 

 black reach from a little below that along the side of the neck 

 and under the wings; throat, breast and belly rich yellow; vent 

 cream coloured, tinged with yellow; wings dark dusky olive; 

 primaries and greater coverts edged and tipt with pale yellow; 

 econd row of coverts wholly yellow; lesser, olive; tail deep 



VOL. ii. 3 B 



