124 BIRDS THROUGH AN OPERA-GLASS. 



XXXV. 



RED-EYED VIREO. 



AMONG the songs that come through the open 

 window in summer, there is one I hear when the 

 midday heat has silenced nearly all the others. It 

 comes from the upper branches of the trees about 

 the house, and is a preoccupied warble, of three 

 loud, guttural notes, given with monotonous va- 

 riety. In rhythm it is something like he-ha-wha 

 or ha-ha-wha, or, again, he-ha-whip in rising in- 

 flection, and he-ha-whee in falling cadence. 



If I go out and focus my glass on the dull- 

 colored bird that moves along over the branches 

 inspecting the leaves in such a business-like way, I 

 discover it to be an exquisite little creature, tinted 

 more delicately than the waxwing, but with much 

 the same glossy look and elegant air. It is a 

 slender bird, about half as large as a robin. Its 

 back is olive, and its breast white, of such tints 

 that when the sunlight is on the leaves our vireo 

 is well disguised, for its back looks like the upper 

 side of the leaf, and its breast like the under side 

 with the sun on it. If the bird considerately flies 

 down into the lower branches, as it turns its head 

 to one side, I can make out its ash-colored cap 

 and the lines that border it, first a black one, 

 then a white, and below that another black line, 

 running through the eye. 



