84 
THK CONDOR 
Vol. lY 
ing and would not have been noticed 
when they were seen, if the exact loca- 
tion had not been known. The nests 
were always so thoroughly concealed 
that it was impossible to photograph 
them situ as there was never any 
point of view that two whole eggs 
could be seen from. 
Ma}" 15 she flushed and disappeared 
while ten feet distant, and by means of 
the transit, was seen to return about 
two minutes later, but there would 
have been no rea.son to suppose that 
there was a bird or nest anywhere 
around if it had not been previously 
located, and considerable clipping was 
necessary to make it possible to see it 
from a distance of fifty feet. She usu- 
ally sat very deep in the ne.st with only 
the beak and tail showing above the 
edge, but at the slightest sound, she 
stood up in the nest and looked all 
around, sliding out on the opposite side 
from anything that appeared, like the 
shadow of a falling leaf. May 17, 8 a. 
m., female setting and passed the time 
eating caterpillars while the nest was 
being examined. She did not go over 
five feet from it this time, till I left 
when she followed for about twenty 
feet, and kept almost within reach, 
watching me very closely with the in- 
tense manner that anyone would un- 
consciously assume if trying to identify 
a bird that is difficult to see but likely 
to be lost altogether if any noise is 
made — as if she were trying to ident- 
ify ??ie. When she started back, 1 
stopped, but she went to the nest not 
having made a .sound all the time. 
The male was usually singing or 
chipping not less than fifty yards 
away, but May 20, he returned silently 
and renewed his attentions in the way 
that I supposed only preceded the egg- 
laying period, but the female showed 
no signs of any eggs forming, when dis- 
sected. The black patch on the throat 
of the male was divided by a horizontal 
white line so it w'as considered nece.s- 
sary to collect them both, but it is a 
custom that never seems to develop 
toleration, and it seems to be more dis- 
tasteful each time, but my ornithologi- 
cal apprenticeship, for about the first 
eight years, was strictly of the opera 
gla.ss order in the case of insectivorous 
and song birds. One day a collection 
of skins was examined for the first time: 
about three out of four of the common 
birds were recognized, the most com- 
plete and mortifying failure being that 
of a yellow warbler. — of course tlie 
labels were not looked at purposely. 
In clear weather, 1 could without any 
glass distinguish the colors of the flags 
of the Weather Bureau, on Blue Hill, 
from Clarendon Hills (in Massachusetts) 
a distance that must be (juite five miles, 
which is a long way in that hazy at- 
mosphere, but for .some reason I can 
never be sure of the exact colors of a 
bird that is not familiar to me, in the 
constantly changing light and shadow 
that it passes through, especially on 
very bright days when the ej^es are 
more or less dazzled, and it seems to me 
perfectly possible that staring at green 
leaves so long and fixedly as is often 
necessary ma}' make colors seem difl'er- 
ent from what they reall}^ are. 
Black-throated gray warblers do not 
object to human as.sociation at all; one 
nest was fifteen feet up on an oak 
branch, directl}^ over a trail that was used 
at least six times a day by people going 
for mail, and generally much oftener. 
It cannot be for protection from jays 
etc., for obvious reasons. The male 
and female seem much more dependent 
on each other when in trouble than 
birds usually are. They hop about the 
branches always within four or five 
feet of each other, looking everywhere 
for the nest. The female does not usu- 
ally begin to complain till after about 
five minutes; and as the male is usually 
too far away to hear her faint chipping, 
she has to go after him, as his louder 
song is nearly always audible. One 
female that was followed for consider- 
ably over one hundred yards, flew rap- 
idly and almost silently from tree to 
tree till about fifty yards from the mate 
