THE OSPHEY. 95 



woods, where the usnea was abundant, in Knox, Lincoln, Waldo and Cumber- 

 land Counties, I was on the alert for the song of this woodland sprite and 

 examined many likely looking folds of lichens with good results. 



June 24th I took the Harpswell Steamer for Clitf Island, Casco Bay, to 

 stay over Sunday with a friend who was interested in the birds. There 

 seemed to be about a dozen pairs of Parulas nesting on this small island. 

 While watching a tiny nest of a Kuby-throat Hunuuer on the limb of a fir 

 tree with its two tiny inmates about one-third grown, I saw a Parula fly to a 

 bunch of usnea hanging from the limb of a Spruce in front of one of the 

 cottages. Oh examination 1 found it contained four young. 1 also examined 

 four other nests in the immediate vicinity, one of which contained one egg 

 laid ))y the owner, and an egg of that pest, Molothrus ater, which had caused 

 the Parula to desert the nest. Then I crossed in a small boat to Jewell's Island, a 

 larger, outer island, where once the Raven had nested in security before the 

 ruthless gunner had worked such changes "down the bay.,' 



Our principal object in visiting Jewell's Island was to ascertain how fared 

 the little colony of Bob-white, which Mrs. McKenney, (who has a summer 

 cottage thereon and who leaves a man the year around to care for the 

 stock and poultry which she keeps there,) had brought from Pennsylvania and 

 liberated on the island. While on this island we found two more nests of 

 the Parula, each containing four eggs. One of the nests was a model of 

 beauty; it hung out on a limb of a fir balsam, that grew on the edge of 

 a high clitf near the .shore. The wind had uprooted this tree and it hung out 

 over the steep side of the cliff. The nest was difficult to locate as the tree was 

 covered with folds of usnea, but a few bits of dead grass, the lining of the 

 nest, were protruding from out the folds of moss and gave the site awa3^ 



In the month of June, the present year, Mr. Morrill and myself went to the 

 locality where the two nests were found on the shore of the lake and found that 

 one pair of our Parulas were nesting in a spruce near the last year's site. 

 Each nest I have examined is a luarvel of beauty, made up as they are almost 

 entirely of usnea, with but a slight lining of hairs or dead grass. The male 

 usuallj^ is found, during the period of incubation, feeding among the foliage of 

 the taller deciduous trees near the nest site, occasionally flying to the nest to 

 see if all is well with his little home and mate. His song is a very pleasing 

 one and is very distinct from any song of our other N. E. Warblers. Of 

 the several nests I have examined all but one were constructed in a natural fold 

 of the lichens, the bird only parting the folds and hollowing out a small apart- 

 ment and slightly lining it. In one nest, only a small fold of usnea was chosen 

 to start with, the birds carrying long folds of the usnea and wreathing it about 

 the limb forming a pendent nest, leaving a small aperture, a small round hole 

 directly under the limb from which it hung, about large enough to insert one's 



