THE OOLOGIST 
always built close to the ground. 
Usually from ten to twenty-four inches 
up, rarely more, and I have seen sevy- 
eral in brush hemlock that were but 
four to six inches off the ground. 
Laurel beds seem to be their fav- 
orite nesting sites. Fully two-thirds 
of the nests I have found were in laur- 
el. Next to laurel thickets and clumps 
of low hemlock, brush is preferred. 
Only rarely do I see one in green 
brush, 
The nests are compact and cup- 
shaped and sometimes are beautiful 
structures. The handsomest warblers 
nests I have ever seen were of this 
species. 
The favorite materials are grape 
vine bark, fine strips of yellow and 
white birch bark and rotten wood. 
Many nests are almost entirely built 
of fine shreds of white and yellow rot- 
ten wood and are very pretty. For- 
lining, fine black rootlets and fine 
grasses are used. Four is the usual 
number of eggs, occasionally only 
three. Have not yet found a set of 
five. All sets I have found were well 
wreathed, but they vary greatly in ex- 
tent of markings. Some are simply 
wreathed and some sets are heavily 
marked all over. 
R. B. SIMPSON. 
—_—_—_—__—_e <> 
The Cerulean Warbler. 
(Dendroica cerulea.) 
A few years ago I spent several sea- 
sons in the mountains of Doddridge 
County, West Virginia in the employ 
of the Standard Oil Company. 
The country there is rougher than 
at my home here. The mountains 
are steeper and run to peaks and 
ridges with none of the platteaus of 
my home hills. 
The timber was big and tall, but 
in that region was entirely hardwood. 
An evergreen was a rare sight. I 
missed the fern and moss-covered 
27 (s ) 65 
depths of the cool hemlock forests of 
Northern Pennsylvania, for here the 
ground in the woods was dry and along 
in the Fall, water was a scarce arti- 
cle. 
Although I didn’t like the country 
a little bit, I found a few birds com- 
mon there, that at home were un- 
known, or occurred only as rare strag- 
glers. 
Of these new ones I was most in- 
terested in the warblers, and found 
several quite desirable species, such 
as the Cerulean, Kentucky, Worm-eat- 
ing, and Golden-winged to be more or 
less common in summer. Of these I 
became much interested in the Ceru- 
lean. 
In nearly twenty years. collecting 
here at Warren, I have never met 
with it but twice. 
I found they arrived there April 
20th, 1896, April 22, 1897, and May 1, 
1898. On the first day of their arriv- 
al several could be heard in almost 
any woods and in a few days they 
were common. I never saw them 
about orchards or farm houses. They 
seemed to prefer the woodland alto- 
gether, and whether open or heavy, 
the songs of the males could be heard 
overhead anywhere, as they spent 
most of their time singing. 
After about August 1st they were 
quiet and soon seemed to have all dis- 
appeared. 
Although so common, I found it a 
difficult matter to find nests. Most of 
my time I spent near the head of a 
little stream well up a mountain-side. 
This place was sloping and not very 
steep. There was also several benches 
or flats and it was heavily timbered 
with mostly oak, hickory and poplar. 
By spending all spare time possible 
in watching the different female birds, © 
especially when near the ground in 
old tree-tops or grape vines, I was en- 
abled to catch a good many hunting 
