60 
HERMIT WOOD-WARBLER. 
Sylvia Townsendi, Townsend's Warbler, Towns., Jour. Acad. Mat. Sc. Phila 
delpliia, vol. vii. p. 191. 
Townsend’s Warbler, Sylvia Townsendi, Aud. Orn. Biog., vol. v. p. 36. 
♦ 
Wings of moderate length, rather pointed, with the second and third quills 
longest, the first and second nearly equal and very little shorter ; tail scarcely 
emarginate. Upper parts light greenish-olive, more yellow behind, all the 
feathers dusky in the centre ; cheeks, ear-coverts, and throat black ; a band 
over the eye, a broader band on the side of the neck, and the fore part of 
the breast bright yellow ; the rest of the lower parts white, but the sides 
marked with oblong dusky spots ; wings blackish-brown ; the secondary 
coverts and first row of small coverts largely tipped with white, the quills 
margined with light grey ; tail-feathers blackish brown, edged with grey ; 
outer two on each side almost entirely white, the next with a small white spot. 
Male, wing 
Columbia river, northward. Migratory. 
HERMIT WOOD- WARBLER. 
Sylvicola occidentalis, Townsend. 
PLATE XCIII. — Male and Eemale. 
Of this species discovered by Mr. Townsend and Mr. Nuttall, in the 
forests of the Columbia river, all that I know is contained in the following 
notes from these enterprising naturalists : — -“ The Hermit Warbler,” says 
Mr. Nuttall, “I have little doubt, breeds in the dark forests of the Colum- 
bia, where we saw and heard it singing in the month of June. It is a 
remarkably shy and solitary bird, retiring into the darkest and most silent 
recesses of the evergreens, where, gaining a glimpse of light by ascending 
the loftiest branches of the gigantic firs, it occupies in solitude a world of its 
own, but seldom invaded even by the prying Jay, who also retreats, -as a last 
resort, to the same sad gloom. In consequence of this eremitic predilection, 
it was with extreme difficulty that we ever got sight of our wily and retiring 
subject, who, no doubt, breeds and feeds in the tops of these pines. Its song, 
frequently heard from the same place, at very regular intervals, for an hour 
