202 



THE MOCKING WREN MARSH WREN. 



occurred where a nest was made in the sleeve of a mower's coat, whicb, 

 in the month of June, was hung up accidentally for two or three days 

 in a shed near a barn. 



THE CAROLINA, OR MOCKING WREN. 



THIS remarkable, mimicking, and Musical Wren, says Nuttall, is a 

 Constant resident in the Southern 

 States, from Virginia to Florida, but 

 is rarely seen at any season north of 

 the line of Maryland or Delaware, 

 though, attracted by the great river 

 courses, they are abundant from 

 Fittsburg to New Orleans. A few 

 individuals stray, in the course of 

 the spring, as far as the line of New 

 York, and appear in New Jersey and 

 the vicinity of Philadelphia early in 

 the month of May. On the 17th of 

 April, returning from a Southern 

 tour of great extent, I again recog- 

 nised my old and pleasing acquain- 

 tance, by his usual note, near Chester, 

 on the Delaware, where, I have little 

 doubt, a few remain and pass the 

 summer, retiring to the South only 

 as the weather becomes inclement. 

 On the banks of the Patapsco, near 

 Baltimore, their song is still heard to 

 the close of November. According 

 to Audubon, the nest of this bird is usually placed in a hole in some 

 low and decayed tree, or in a fence post ; sometimes also in a stable, 

 barn, or out-house. The materials employed are hay, dry grass, and 

 leaves, for the outer part ; with a lining of horse-hair, or the capillary 

 dry fibres of the Long-moss (Tillandsia. Sometimes the nest is five 

 or six inches deep, but, with the usual precaution of the family, so 

 arrow in the entrance as only to admit of one of the birds at a time. 

 The eggs, five to eight, are oval, and greyish-white, spotted with 

 reddish-brown. Like the common species, an individual (probably 

 one of the young birds) has been observed to roost for a time in an old 

 Wood-Thrush's nest which had been filled with fallen leaves. They 

 are so prolific as to raise two, and sometimes three broods in a season. 



THE MOCKlNG-'WXE.f. 



SHORT-BILLEF MARSH-WREN. 



THIS amusing and not unmusical little species inhabits the lowest 

 marshy meadows, but does not frequent the reed-flats. It never visits 

 cultivated grounds, and is at all times shy, timid, and suspicious. It 

 an ives in Massachusetts about the close of the first week in May, and 



