THE HOUSE WREN. 127 



was the Wood Wren, T. Americanus, it being found from Maine to the 

 Rocky Mountains, as well as on the Columbia river, from which specimens 

 have been brought by Mr. Townsend. The House Wren, if I am not 

 greatly mistaken, passes southward of the United States, to spend the winter. 

 The other spends that season within our limits. 



Dr. Bachman informs me that a bird resembling the Wood Wren, as well 

 as the House Wren, so closely that he could never distinguish it from either 

 species, spends its winters in great numbers in South Carolina. Dr. Brewer 

 has favoured me with the following notice respecting the House Wren. 

 "This bird never constructs with us a distinct nest, but always conceals it in 

 olive-jars, boxes, and such things, placed for its convenience around the 

 houses, or in the hollow of trees. Whenever the places in which they build 

 are larger than necessary, they usually endeavour to fill up the vacant parts 

 with additional materials. I have by me a nest built two years since in the 

 clothes-line box of Professor Ware of Cambridge, which is in size con- 

 siderably more than a foot square; and it must have cost its tiny architect 

 many days of hard labour to have arranged there such a mass of various 

 materials. The variety and size of some of those of which it is composed 

 is truly surprising. Among them are the exuvia of a snake several feet in 

 length, large twigs, pieces of India-rubber suspenders (which, by the way, 

 are old acquaintances) oak-leaves, feathers, pieces of shavings, hair, hay, &c. 

 It contained six eggs, which evidently were suffered to become stale in con- 

 sequence of the anxiety of the bird to fill up the empty space." The eggs 

 measure five-eighths of an inch in length, and four and a half eighths in 

 breadth. 



House Wren, Sylvia domestica, Wils. Amer. Orn., vol. i. p. 129. 



Troglodytes .edon, Bonap. Syn., p. 92. 



House Wren, Nutt. Man., vol. i. p. 422. 



Troglodytes .edon, House Wren, Swains. & Rich. F. Bor. Amer., vol. ii. p. 316. 



House Wren, Troglodytes cedon, Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. i. p. 427; vol. v. p. 470. 



Adult Male. 



Bill of ordinary length, nearly straight, slender, acute, subtrigonal at the 

 base, compressed towards the tip; upper mandible with the ridge obtuse, the 

 sides convex towards the end, concave at the base, the edges acute and over- 

 lapping; under mandible with the back and sides convex. Nostrils oblong, 

 straight, basal, with a cartilaginous lid above, open and bare. Head ovate, 

 eyes of moderate size, neck of ordinary length, body ovate, nearly equal in 

 breadth and depth. Legs of ordinary length; tarsus longer than the middle 

 toe, compressed, covered anteriorly with six scutella, posteriorly with a long 

 plate forming an acute angle. Toes scutellate above, inferiorly granulate, 



