THE SHORT-BILLED MARSH WREN. 265 



the time down out of sight in the clumps of bushes, the tall 

 grasses or the still taller sedges; but one is constantly aided 

 in the search for them by their noisy notes and odd songs. 

 Chip-chip-chi-chi-chi-chi, or tsip-tsip-tse-tse-tse-tse — the first 

 two or three notes being uttered more slowly, the rest 

 very rapidly, and all in a sharp, metallic and spirited tone 

 — may represent the song, which is not very musical, 

 indeed, but rather pleasing, and decidedly enlivening to 

 these otherwise quiet marshes. Like any other Wren, this 

 species is exceedingly sprightly in all its motions, and is a 

 very adept at clinging to and sliding up and down the 

 culms of grasses and sedges — tipping, tilting and tossing 

 its tail in every conceivable manner. In voice and in action 

 it is certainly an intensely animated bit of nature. Scarcely 

 4.50 long, and very slender, it is streaked with light and 

 dark brown over the head, nearly black, mixed with some 

 reddish brown and streaked with white on the back, wings 

 and tail dusky, barred with light brown, under parts gray- 

 ish-white, shading into light brown on the sides. 



The nest, about the size and shape of a common cocoa- 

 nut, composed of dried and thoroughly bleached grasses 

 and sedges, is closely compacted, with a clear round open- 

 ing on the side near the top, and is more or less lined with 

 vegetable down. This structure rests on the ground at the 

 roots of the sedges, or is tied to their culms a very few inches 

 from the ground. In this and corresponding localities it is 

 made early in June. The eggs, some V or 8, about .54X.48, 

 so rather roundish — (Dr. Coues reports them "rather elon- 

 gate ") — are of a fine porcelain-white, having the highly 

 finished surface of the Woodpecker's eggs. These white 

 eggs are an anomaly among Wrens. 



The Short-billed Marsh Wrens are said by Nuttall — 

 who was the first to point them out as different from the 



