344 
FLYCATCHERS 
the Phoebe’s place and singing the Phoebe’s song. He was not intended 
to adorn a bridge or barn, but in the darkened woods, high up in the 
trees, he finds a congenial home. 
His pensive, gentle ways are voiced by his sad, sweet call: 
The notes are as musical and restful, as much a part 
£ £ iZ Nature’s hymn, as the soft humming of a brook. 
All day long the Pewee sings; even when the heat 
of summer silences more vigorous birds, and the 
midday sun sends light-shafts to the ferns, the 
clear, sympathetic notes of the retiring songster 
come from the green canopy overhead, in perfect harmony with the 
peace and stillness of the hour. 
The Western Wood Pewee ( Myiochanes richardsoni richardsoni ) has 
been recorded from Wisconsin (Cory, Birds Ills, and Wise., 536). 
Pee-a-wee 
463. Empidonax fiaviventris Baird. Yellow-bellied Flycatcher. 
Ads. — Upperparts rather dark olive-green; wings and tail fuscous; greater 
and lesser wing-coverts tipped with white or yellowish white; underparts 
sulphur-yellow, the belly pure, the throat, breast, and sides more or less 
washed with olive-green; upper mandible black, lower mandible whitish or 
flesh-color ; second to fourth primaries of equal length, the first shorter than 
the fifth. Im. — Yellow of the underparts brighter, wing-bars more yel- 
low, and sometimes tinged with pale ochraceous-buff. L., 5’63; W., 2*65; 
T., 2T6; B. from N., *33. 
Remarks. — This is the most yellow of our small Flycatchers. In any 
plumage the entire underparts, including the throat , are sulphur-yellow or 
dusky yellowish. In the other eastern species of this genus the throat is 
white. 
Range. — Breeds in Canadian zone from n. Alberta, n. Man., n. Que., 
and N. F., s. to N. D., n. Minn., n. Mich., n. N. Y., Pa. (mts.), and N. H.; 
w. in migration to the e. border of the Plains, e. Tex., and e. Pvlex.; winters 
from s. Mex. to Panama, occasional in migration in w. Fla.; accidental in 
Greenland. 
Washington, rather common T. V., May; July 28-Oct. 6. Ossining, 
common T. V., May 17-June 4; Aug. 8-Sept. 20. Cambridge, T. V., some- 
times rather common, May 25-June 3; Aug. 28-Sept. 8. N. Ohio, rare T. V., 
May 10. Glen Ellyn, rather rare T. V., May 20-June 5; Sept. 3. SE. Minn., 
common, T. V., May 19. 
Nest, of moss, lined with grasses, on the ground, beneath the roots of a 
tree or imbedded in moss. Eggs, 4, creamy white, with numerous pale cin- 
namon-brown markings, chiefly about the larger end, *68 x '54. Date , 
Wilmurt, N. Y., June 10; Grand Manan, N. B., June 16, inc. adv. 
To see this little Flycatcher at his best, one must seek the northern 
evergreen forest, where, far from human habitation, its mournful 
notes blend with the murmur of some icy brook tumbling over mossy 
stones or gushing beneath the still mossier decayed logs that threaten 
to bar its way. Where all is green and dark and cool, in some glen 
overarched by crowding spruces and firs, birches and maples, there it is 
we find him, and in the beds of damp moss he skilfully conceals his 
nest. He sits erect on some low twig, and, like other Flycatchers, the 
snap of his bill tells of a sally after his winged prey. He glides quietly 
away when approached, and his occasional note of complaint may be 
heard as long as one remains in his vicinity. During the migration 
