WOOD THRUSH 383 



maple, and measures four and a half to five inches in 

 diameter from outside to outside of the rim, and one 

 and three quarters deep within. It is quite firm (except 

 the external leaves falling off), the rim about three 

 quarters of an inch thick, and it is composed externally 

 of leaves, apparently chiefly chestnut, very much de- 

 cayed, beneath which, in the place of the grass and 

 stubble of which most nests are composed, are appar- 

 ently the midribs of the same leaves, whose whole pulp, 

 etc., is gone, arranged as compactly and densely (in 

 a curving manner) as grass or stubble could be, upon a 

 core, not of mud, but a pale-brown composition quite 

 firm and smooth (within), looking like inside of a cocoa- 

 nut-shell, and apparently composed of decayed leaf 

 pulp (?), which the bird has perhaps mixed and ce- 

 mented with its saliva. This is about a quarter of an 

 inch thick and about as regular as a half of a cocoanut- 

 shell. Within this, the lower part is lined with consider- 

 able rather coarse black root-fibre and a very little fine 

 stubble. From some particles of fine white sand, etc., 

 on the pale-brown composition of the nest, I thought it 

 was obtained from the pond shore. This composition, 

 viewed through a microscope, has almost a cellular 

 structure. 



Aug. 9, 1858. The wood thrush's was a peculiarly 

 woodland nest, made solely of such materials as that 

 unfrequented grove afforded, the refuse of the wood or 

 shore of the pond. There was no horsehair, no twine 

 nor paper nor other relics of art in it. 



[See also under General and Miscellaneous, pp. 

 404, 427.] 



