THE LONG-BILLED MARSH WREN. 193 



THIS interesting and not generally well-known little bird 

 is a summer inhabitant of New England. Although 

 not uncommon in Massachusetts and the other two southern 

 States, it seldom ventures north of the first State, where it 

 is confined to the neighborhood of the salt-water marshes. 

 It makes its appearance about the middle of May ; and its 

 presence is soon made known by its lively, chattering song, 

 and grotesque dodgings among the reeds and tall grass in 

 which it makes its home. I cannot refrain from giving the 

 exceedingly interesting account of its habits, &c., by Wilson. 

 -He says, 



" The Marsh Wren arrives in Pennsylvania about the middle of 

 May, or as soon as the reeds and a species of nymphea, usually 

 called splatter-docks, which grow in great luxuriance along the tide- 

 water of our rivers, are sufficiently high to shelter it. To such 

 places it almost wholly limits its excursions, seldom venturing far 

 from the river. Its food consists of flying insects and their larvae, 

 and a species of green grasshopper that inhabits the reeds. As to its 

 motes, it would be mere burlesque to call them by the name of song. 

 Standing on the reedy borders of the Schuylkill or Delaware, in the 

 month of June, you hear a low crackling sound, somewhat similar 

 to that produced by air-bubbles forcing their way through mud or 

 boggy ground when trod upon. This is the song of the Marsh 

 Wren : but as, among the human race, it is not given to one man 

 to excel in every thing, and yet each perhaps has something pecu- 

 liarly his own ; so, among birds, we find a like distribution of talents 

 and peculiarities. The little bird now before us, if deficient and 

 contemptible in singing, excels in the art of design, and constructs 

 a nest which, in durability, warmth, and convenience, is scarcely 

 inferior to one, and far superior to many, of its more musical breth 

 ren. This is formed outwardly of wet rushes mixed with mud, 

 well intertwined, and fashioned into the form of a cocoanut. A 

 small hole is left two-thirds up for entrance, the upper edge of 

 which projects like a pent-house over the lower to prevent the 

 admission of rain. The inside is lined with fine soft grass, and 

 sometimes feathers ; and the outside, when hardened by the sun, 

 resists every kind of weather. This nest is generally suspended 



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