^ 



Tke I'oiuig Ornithologist. 



days, and in no case did I find more 

 than three eggs to a set, and I am fully 

 convinced that is all they lay, as mcu- 

 bation was far advanced in nearly all 

 the sets. I have carefully looked over 

 some sets that I have and find them all 

 very much alike, and of a pale clay col- 

 or spotted with dark brown and black 

 spots and small flashes with markings of 

 purple. Davie, in his Check-list, says 

 he fails to see any line?, and gives the 

 size as 1.76 by 1.28, and says the sets 

 in his cabinet is as follows ; 1.83 by i. 

 29, 1.83 by 1.29, 1.75 by 1.28 and i. 

 64 by 1.28. I have three sets before 

 me, and cannot find them anything 

 like his in size ; I take the largest sets 

 I have and they are as follows , 1.37 by 

 .99, 1,82 by .98, and 1.40 by i.oo. 

 Mine were all collected on the "shin- 

 gle" of the beach. A skin of one of 

 these birds shot by Mr. Geo. Noble, of 

 this place, is now in the Smithsonian 

 Institute, registered as Wilson's Plover, 

 and numbered 16,176 leaving little 

 doubt about it being anything else. 

 v. D. Perry, 

 Savannah, Ga. 

 Nov. 9th, '85. 



WATER THRUSH. 



CONCLUDED. 



Although from our early settlement in 

 what was then the Canadian backwoods, 

 I had been well acquainted with the 

 appearance of this inhabitantof the wil- 

 derness, for often when in search of cat- 

 tle or otherwise rambling in the forest, 

 I frequently came suddenly to the bank 

 of a creek or the margin of a pool where 

 this species might be seen at woik or 

 hastly seeking concealment'; yet until 

 but a few years ago I had no personal 

 knowledge ol its nest or eggs. In mv 



early studies of our wild birds, when I 

 began to distinguish one species from 

 another, observing several nests of what 

 I have since identified as those of the 

 Winter Wren, but only seeing the Wag- 

 tail in the vicinity, and supposing it to 

 be the owner, I named it the Moss-buil- 

 der ; afterwards as I discovered my mi;:- 

 take, I called it the Wood Wagtail, but 

 from Ross's "Birds of Canada." I learn- 

 ed it to be the Water Thrush. 



In the early part of June, 1882, 1 was 

 out on a collecting trip in a piece of 

 low woods west of this town, and in ex- 

 amining the up -turned root of a large 

 tree, beneath which was a pool of water, 

 a bird suddenly darted out and plunged 

 into the water, from which, however, it 

 made a hasty exit, and disappeared 

 among some brushwood. Discovering 

 the nest, I found it to contain four 

 nearly incubated eggs and a young Cow- 

 bird just hatched. This nest, placed in 

 a deep cavity, was so like that of the 

 Jinco, as were also the eggs, that 1 would 

 have believed them to have belonged to 

 that species, had not the owner returned 

 and coming close I was certain of her 

 identity as a Water Thrush. The next 

 spring on the 21st of May, I was cros- 

 sing a piece of low wood on my own 

 farm — Wild- Wood, when the notes of a 

 Water Thrush attracted my attention, 

 and infering she had a nest in the vicin- 

 ity, I examined a turned up root near 

 by, and found on a kind of shelf about 

 a foot above the water a nest with two 

 fresh eggs ; three days later I returned 

 and found the full set of five eggs, which 

 I took and they are now in my collec- 

 tion. This nest was formed of dry leaves, 

 moss, a species of lichen, and lined 

 with fine hair. The eggs are of a clear 

 white hue, mottled (especially towards 

 the large end) with bran colored s])nts. 



