1881.] Notes on the Breeding of a few Western Birds. 211 
pare with that of the mocking-bird, is a resident by no means 
' rare in Southern California. It is, however, very shy and plunges 
abruptly into the nearest bushes on being approached or disturbed. 
It nests, after the fashion of all its family, in low trees or bushes, 
near the ground, and preferably in a thicket ‘or secluded place. 
The only nest with eggs that I found was at Cotton, Cal., a short 
time after leaving Los Angeles. It was situated in a low elder 
tree, and was composed of coarse twigs and grasses, and lined 
with fine rootlets; resembling the nests of others of the Harpo- 
rhynchus family, it was not so large as any of them. The three 
eggs, which constituted the complement, were well incubated. 
They were of a light pea-green color, marked quite thickly at the 
larger end with dark brown spots of a considerable size, and were 
rather elongated. Some weeks later, on the Colorado desert, at 
a station called Flowing Wells, I found a nest and two eggs of 
the LeConte’s thrush (Harporhynchus lecontei), a variety of the 
1. redivivus, according to Dr. Coues. It is a smaller and lighter 
colored bird than H. redivivus, and its nest and eggs are consider- 
ably different. The nest was placed in a palo verde tree and was 
a very bulky affair, measuring externally nine inches in depth and 
six in width; the hollow of the nest was fully three inches in 
depth. It was so awkwardly situated that much of the base of — 
the nest had evidently been filled in to’ firmly support the struc- 
ture. The two eggs were somewhat smaller than those of 1. 
redivivus, lighter in color and marked all over with finer reddish 
spots, thicker at the larger end. 
Campylorhynchus brunneicapillus is the long name given by 
scientists to a very odd little creeper wren which is peculiar to 
the south-western States and Territories. The cactus wren, so 
called from its habit of nesting in the cactus whenever available, 
is stationary in its habitat, keeping together in little flocks during 
the winter and separating early in the spring into pairs. They 
are very early breeders, numerous dates in February being given 
for the finding of nests and eggs. It was the tenth of April, how- 
ever, before I succeeded in finding a nest with eggs, but shortly 
after I found nests containing large young ones. Their nests are 
worthy of notice, for they have no resemblance to the nests of 
any other birds in our fauna. They are shaped somewhat like a 
retort, afid are laid on. the branches or between the forks of a cactus. 
The body of the nest is rounded, a as large as a man’s head, 
