DENDRCECA ^ESTIVA : SUMMER YELLOW-BIRD. 123 



rows or other shrubbery in fields and pastures, as bar- 

 berry and currant-bushes, or in thickets of willows or 

 alders along the banks of streams and in other low 

 moist situations. It is a neat, compact, and durable 

 structure, -of soft vegetable and animal substances, 

 closely felted together, but so miscellaneous as to be 

 scarcely described in few words. Soft cottony mate- 

 rial, such as plant-down of various kinds, are always 

 conspicuous in these structures, which usually also 

 include wool, hair, silk, and sometimes a few feathers ; 

 these felting materials being added to a frame-work of 

 fine grasses and weed-tops. The eggs are from 3 to 

 5 in number, commonly 4 or 5, among which may 

 often be found the Cow-bird's egg the Summer 

 Warbler being one of the birds most persistently victim- 

 ized by the reprobate tramp of a Molothrus, and one 

 which sometimes displays great ingenuity in avoiding 

 the disagreeable task of incubating the alien egg, by 

 adding a second story to its nest, thus leaving the hate- 

 ful object in the basement below, out of the hatching 

 way forever. The eggs measure from 0.64 to 0.69 in 

 length, by 0.48 to 0.53 in breadth; they are usually 

 dull grayish-white or greenish-white, sometimes more 

 purely white, variously dotted, spotted, and blotched 

 with different shades of reddish-brown and lilac, chiefly 

 about the larger end. The gay color of this Warbler 

 makes a pretty spot as the bird flits through the green 

 foliage of the forest or plays amidst the rose-tinted 

 blossoms of the fruit-orchard ; and its sprightly song 

 is one of the most familiar sounds of bird-life during 

 the season when the year renews its youth. 



