BLACK-THROATED GREEN WOOD-WARBLER. 43 



march is also rapid, and by the middle of October they all seem to have pass- 

 ed beyond the limits of our most southern States. 



The food of this species consists during the summer months of various 

 kinds of flies and caterpillars, many of the former of which it captures by 

 darting after them from its perch, in the manner of Flycatchers and Vireos, 

 emitting like them also a clicking sound from its bill. In the autumn it is 

 often seen feeding on small berries of various sorts, in which respect also it 

 resembles the birds just mentioned. I never found the nest of this bird, of 

 which, however, Mr. Ntjttall has given a minute description, which I 

 shall here, with his permission, place before you. "Last summer (1830), on 

 the 8th of June, I was so fortunate as to find a nest of this species in a per- 

 fectly solitary situation, on the Blue Hills of Milton. The female was now 

 sitting, and about to hatch. The nest was in a low, thick, and stunted Vir- 

 ginia juniper. When I approached near to the nest, the female stood mo- 

 tionless on its edge, and peeped down in such a manner that I imagined her 

 to be a young bird; she then darted directly to the earth and ran, but when, 

 deceived, I sought her on the ground, she had very expertly disappeared; 

 and I now found the nest to contain four roundish eggs, white, inclining to 

 flesh-colour, variegated, more particularly at the great end, with pale pur- 

 plish points of various sizes, interspersed with other large spots of brown and 

 blackish. The nest was formed of circularly entwined fine stripes of the in- 

 ner bark of the juniper, and the tough white fibrous bark of some other plant, 

 then bedded with soft feathers of the Robin, and lined with a few horse 

 hairs, and some slender tops of bent grass (tflgrostis)." 



My friend describes the notes of this species as follows: — "This simple, 

 rather drawling, and somewhat plaintive song, uttered at short intervals, re- 

 sembles the syllables 'te de' territica, sometimes lederisca, pronounced pretty 

 loud and slow, and the tones proceeding from high to low." These notes I 

 am well acquainted with, but none can describe the songs of our different 

 species like Nuttall. 



I have represented the male and female; the latter, I believe, has not been 

 hitherto figured. 



Black-throated Green Warbler, Sylvia virens, Wils. Amer. Orn., vol. ii. p. 127. 

 Sylvia virens, Bonap. Syn., p. 80. 



Black-throated Green Warbler, Nutt. Man., vol. i. p. 376. 

 Black-throated Green Warbler, Sylvia virens, Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. iv. p. 70. 



Outer three quills almost equal, second very slightly longer; tail slightly 

 emarginate. Male with the upper parts very light yellowish-green; the an- 

 terior part of the forehead, a band over the eye, the cheeks, and the sides of 



