The Red-Eyed Vireo 235 



is built and how firmly it is attached to the limbs. The prin- 

 cipal part of the outside of it consists of grass blades and the 

 fiber of plants, and the inside is lined with very fine straws. 

 No hair has been used in its construction. The outside parts 

 seem to be glued together. I have several of these nests and 

 they all seem to be fastened to the twigs with the same ma- 

 terial, and it very much resembles the very fine fiber of the 

 flax plant. It is very strong. The nest is usually found from 

 four to thirty feet from the ground in a strong growing weed 

 or in a bush. Often they are built in the shade trees about 

 our homes in the city. In 1903 one built its nest so close to 

 the front steps leading up to my neighbor's residence that one 

 could have easily put his hands into it, and I doubt if he ever 

 knew that it was there. Three to five eggs with a few dark 

 specks on them constitute a clutch. I have no records relat- 

 ing to the incubation of these birds and I find nothing in the 

 books about it. 



The vireos are very musical even more so than the 

 warblers and of them the red-eyed is the most musical. At 

 Buzzard's Roost we have large numbers of them and they 

 make the woods resonant with their songs. It is by their song 

 that I know them best, for they are difficult birds to get sight 

 of. Their song has had many interpretations. Mr. Wilson 

 Flagg, who calls the red-eyed vireo "The Preacher," says: 

 "This style of preaching is not declamation. Though constant- 

 ly talking, he takes the part of the deliberate orator, who ex- 

 plains his subject in a few words, and then makes a pause for 

 his hearers to reflect upon it. We might suppose him to be 

 repeating moderately, with a pause between each sentence 

 'you see it you know it do you hear me do you believe it?' 

 All these strains are delivered with a rising reflection at the 

 close, and with a pause, as if waiting for an answer." Mr. 

 Chapman and Miss Blanchan concur with Mr. Flagg in his in- 

 terpretation of the song and the manner of its uttering. Mrs. 

 Mabel Osgood Wright says he is "The Talker," and that "this 

 is what he says, stopping between every sentence: 'I know it 

 I made it mustn't touch it shouldn't like it if you do it 

 I'll know it you'll rue it.' " Miss Merriman says : "His 

 song is a monotonous but cheerful monologue made up of 



