SETOPHAGA. 179 



This well-known species, the only migratory member of the genus, has a very wide 

 range in the winter months throughout Eastern Mexico and the whole of Central 

 America ; and beyond these limits it extends its travels as far south as about the line of 

 the equator, being found at this season throughout the northern portion of the South- 

 American continent, and probably in all of the West-Indian Islands. Its limits in 

 Mexico seem confined to the eastern portion of the republic, as we have no tidings of it 

 from Western Mexico ; but as we approach the southern frontier it crosses to the Pacific, 

 and has been recorded from Tehuantepec by Professor Sumichrast ^i. In Guatemala it 

 spreads from one ocean to the other, and in altitude to about 8000 feet. We find it, 

 however, at the sea-level near Belize and elsewhere ; and it is more common in the hot 

 than in the colder country. In other parts of Central America it is equally abundant ; 

 and hardly a collection of birds made during the winter months in that country fails to 

 contain specimens. 



Its habits have been very fully described by North-American writers, amongst whom 

 Dr. Coues may be specially mentioned ^^. In Guatemala its chief resort is second-growth 

 woods and the edges of the older forests, where its search for insects is carried on with 

 incessant perseverance. 



In the north it only resides during the summer, when the business of reproduction is 

 carried out. It there spreads over temperate North America, especially the Eastern 

 Province, its northern limit reaching Fort Simpson, and its western Utah ^^. 



Its nest is described as placed in a fork of a tree about five feet from the ground, and 

 as composed of varied materials, such as vegetable fibres, grass, strips of bark, &c. ; these 

 are loosely woven and lined with fine grasses, pine-ldaves, and horsehair. The eggs, 

 five in number, are white, blotched and dotted with purple, lilac, and brown ^^. 



B. Sexus similes; alee breviores, magis rotundatce ; rectrices laterales fere totce ant in 



parte terminali late albas. 



a. Supra nitenti-nigra ; speculum alare late album ; abdomen coccineum. 



2. Setophaga picta. 



Setophaga picta, Sw. Zool. 111. ser. 3, i. t. 3^ ; Bp. Consp. i. p. 312 ^ Scl. P. Z. S. 1855, p. 66 ^ ; 

 1856, p. 292*; 1858, p. 299'; 1859, p. 374% Scl. & Salv. Ibis, 1859, p. 12'; Baird, U.S. 

 Bound. Surv. ii. Birds, p. 11 "; Rev. Am. B.i. p. 256'; Taylor, Ibis, 1860, p. 110"; Sumi- 

 chrast, Mem. Bost. Soc. N. H. i. p. 546"; Lawr. Mem. Bost. Soc. N. H. ii. p. 270'"; 

 Bull. U.S. Nat. Mus. no. 4, p. 16''; Coues, B. Col. Vail. i. p. 335"; Salv. Ibis, 1878, 

 p. 306". 



Muscicapa leucomus, Giraud, Sixteen B. Tex. t. 6. f. 1 ". 



Muscicapa tricolor, Licht. Mus. Berol." (fide Bp. Consp. i. p. 313). 



Nitenti-nigra; macula supra et infra oculos, tectricibus alarum mediis et majoribus,secundariorum marginibus, 

 subalaribus et ventre imo albis, crisso albo ad basin nigro ; abdomine medio coccineo ; rectriee extima 



23* 



