HABITS OP Lucy's warbler 221 



it prove so," Dr. Brewer recently replied, "it would in this 

 respect differ from all the other members of this well-marked 

 group"; nevertheless, on the fifth page following, in the same 

 work, Dr. Brewer describes a nest of Melminthophaga peregrina, 

 which, he says, "was built in a low clump of bushes". Some 

 uncertainty in the case continues, I regret to say, though ac- 

 counts of a nest and eggs, fully believed to be those of Lucy's 

 Warbler, and confirming my surmise of its non-terrestrial nidi- 

 fication, have been published both by Dr. Brewer and myself. 

 Writing from Tucson, Arizona, under date of May 19, 1872, 

 Lieut, (now Captain) Charles Bendire informed me by letter 

 that he had that day found a nest " of a very small warbler, 

 four inches long, which has a bright chestnut spot on the crown, 

 and the tail coverts of the same color, the other upper parts 

 cinereous, the lower parts dull white". I shortly afterward 

 published the account in the American Naturalist, and another 

 notice, based on the same data, was next year put on record 

 by Dr. Brewer, as above cited. The eggs were describeil as 

 four in number, nearly globular in shape, scarcely larger than 

 a Hummingbird's, white, with fine red spots at the larger end : 

 they contained large embryos. They were placed between the 

 bark and main wood of a dead mezquite tree, about four feet 

 from the ground. The bird described was surely no other than 

 Lucy's Warbler: the only question is, whether the nest and 

 eggs belonged to it. The ostensible evidence, however, is with- 

 out flaw, and may be accepted until rebutted, though it is against 

 the analogy of uidiflcation in this genus upon which Dr. Brewer 

 has properly dwelt. 



Lucy's Warbler is thus far only known from the Territory of 

 Arizona, and its abode in winter, which we may presume to be 

 in Mexico, remains to be ascertained, as does also probably 

 its limit of distribution in other directions. It was first fig- 

 ured by Mr. D. G. Elliot on plate V of his splendid work, 

 and subsequently by the authors of the "History of North 

 American Birds", from a drawing of the head made by Mr. 

 Eidgway. The citations at the head of this article indicate 

 nearly the whole of the literature the little bird has occasioned 

 up to the date of present writing, and include only one syno- 

 nym, namely, that resulting from the reference of the species 

 to the genus Mniotilta by Professor Giebel, who, in 1875, threw 

 nearly all the Sylvicolinm together under this head, as Mr. George 

 Robert Gray had likewise done before him. 



