BIRDS OF MINNESOTA. 3871 
descriptions vary extremely from on the ground near the root 
of a decaying tree to a hole in a tree, or a niche in projecting 
rocks, the drain of a house, and elevated all the way from the 
first mentioned position, to several feet from the ground. Its 
composition certainly does not vary so remarkably, for all 
reports corroborate my own observation that it is formed of 
coarse fibres of different barks and leaves, with grasses. My 
specimen embraces little or no grass, but afew bits of thread 
or strings. The note of this Warbler is very pleasing 
although humble, and may be described as somewhat resembl- 
ing the formulation—pits-ee, pits-ee, pits-ee, pits-ee, rather mo- 
notonously repeated, with brief interruptions while flitting from 
the trunk or lower limbs of one tree to the roots of another. 
They commence to build about the 15th of May, as indicated 
by the nest obtained on the island alluded to, as observations 
were maintained from the first, and bring out their brood in 13 
days after the female takes finally to her nest. The eggs were 
four in number, and of acreamy white, speckled irregularly 
with fine dots of reddish-brown, thickest near the larger end. 
They breed extensively in the forests bordering the northern 
lakes, as Mr. Lewis and others have found. In common with 
its family, it migrates southward very soon after the earlier 
frosts. Breeds at Vermilion lake, St. Louis county. (Mr. U. 
S. Grant’s Report.) 
SPECIFIC CHARACTERS. 
Bill with the upper mandible considerably decurved; the 
lower one straight, general color of the male black, the feathers 
broadly edged with white; the head all round black, with a 
median stripe in the crown and neck above, a superciliary and 
maxillary stripe of white. Middle of belly, two conspicuous 
bands on the wings, outer edges of tertials, and inner of all the 
wing and tail feathers, and a spot on the inner webs of the 
outer two tail feathers, white. Rump and upper tail coverts 
black, edged externally with white. 
Length, 5; wing, 2.85; tail, 2.25. 
Habitat, eastern United States to the Plains, 
HELMINTHOPHILA PINUS (L.). (641.) 
BLUE-WINGED WARBLER. 
What this little warbler has denied it in the force, and 
melody of its song, is made up to it in the beauty of its colors. 
It is a thing of beauty and therefore ‘‘a joy forever.” The 
eye that having seen it in its freshness of vernal plumage, 
does not feel a thrill of joy at its return after the long months 
