312 BIRDS OF MASSACHUSETTS. 



hensions for its young. Its song is simple, pleasant, and 

 suited to the places where it resides. 



These birds commence building their nest in May. It is in 

 thickets, on or near the ground, among dry leaves, brush or 

 withered grass, which may protect it from observation. It is 

 made of dry sedge grass and leaves, with a lining of fine bent 

 grass. The eggs are about five, of a soft white, with specks, 

 blotches, and sometimes lines of brown chiefly toward the lar- 

 ger end. At the close of July the male ceases to sing, and the 

 old and young rove about in parties till the season warns them 

 to depart. 



The MouRNiNq Warbler, Sylvia Philadelphia^ is a rare 

 species, but Dr. Brewer assures me that he has seen it here in 

 summer Yery little is known of its habits, and I believe, 

 nothing whatever of its nest. Sylvia agilis is now belived to 

 be the young of this bird. Prince Bonaparte believed that the 

 mourning warbler would turn out to be an accidental variety of 

 the species just described. It is said, however, to be quite dif- 

 ferent in its song. 



The Willow Wren, Sylvia t?'ochilus, is the same which, in 

 England, is called the hay-bird. Nuttall says that it visits us 

 in October, when it feeds on flies and other insects, and often 

 is seen rising with a low and pleasant song from the tops of 

 trees. It is named from its attachment to the willow. 



The Worm-eating Warbler, Sylvia vermivora, arrives from 

 the south late in the spring, and retreats early, before the north- 

 ern storrhs. It was not known to breed in this State till a 

 nest was discovered in Cambridge by Mr. Rotch, who gave a 

 specimen of the eggs to Dr. Brewer. That gentleman, it is to 

 be hoped, will hereafter find time to supply the defect of infor- 

 mation on this part of the subject, to which very little atten- 

 tion has been paid. 



The Golden-winged Warbler, Sylvia chrysoptera, which 



