THE BIOLOGICAL REVIEW. 67 



before the snow was quite off the ground. They came every 

 day into my yard and gathered pigs' hair for nest building, but 

 they found .out a bundle of cow hair which I had placed in an 

 old shed, and this they carrried away in large beakfuls. I tried 

 to line them and thus find their nest, but after crossing my 

 fields they mounted over the tree tops and were lost to me. 



While they were feeding their young ones they frequently 

 paid me a visit, and I noticed how much more yellow they had 

 about the wings and rump than in the winter season. And one 

 day in May they came and brought with them four young birds, 

 full-fledged and marked like the hen birds in fall plumage. 

 They remained for many days about my door and on the trees 

 around the yard, and although I would gladly have had them in 

 my cabinet, I loved them too well to do them any violence, 

 thinking that perhaps they would not leave me ; but they went, 

 and have not yet returned. 



Last July I saw a 9 Humming Bird gathering dandelion 

 down, evidently to line her nest, and in August she brought 

 four young birds into our garden every day, until the cold 

 weather drove them south. 



A pair" of Towhees (P. erythrophthalmus) nested here last 

 summer. I did not succeed in finding the nest, but they reared 

 their brood of young ones. 



(June 6, 1892.) While walking along the banks of the river, 

 which runs through my farm, I observed a small bird dart out 

 from a bunch of ferns which grew on the side of a small knoll, 

 and, on stooping down and looking carefully about, I at last 

 found the nest. The bird had scraped a hole out of the bank, 

 by the roots of a bunch of old bracken (Pteris aqulina), which 

 was partly broken dowm, and the new fronds growing up 

 through the old formed as fine a protection as well could be. 



On lifting up the fronds and looking in, I saw a pretty little 

 nest, built of moss, pine needles and dry grass, and well lined 

 with hair from a cow's tail. The nest contained four pretty 

 'little eggs, -§-', (-625) x 7-16, ('4375), the ground color white, finely 

 mottled all over with small, reddish spots, more numerous 

 towards the large end ; incubation had just begun. 



I thought from the glimpse of the bird I caught, when she 



