138 
SYLVIA CASTANEA. 
. 
7 . 
107 . SYLVIA CASTANEA , WILSON. BAY-BREASTED WARBLER. 
WILSON, PLATE XIV. FIG. IV. 
This very rare species passes through Pennsylvania 
about the beginning of May, and soon disappears. It has 
many of the habits of the titmouse, and all their activity ; 
hanging among the extremities of the twigs, and darting 
about from place to place, with restless diligence, in 
search of various kinds of the larvee of insects. It 
is never seen here in summer, and very rarely on its 
return, owing, no doubt, to the greater abundance of 
foliage at that time, and to the silence and real scarcity 
of the species. Of its nest and egg, we are altogether 
uninformed. 
The length of this bird is five inches, breadth, eleven ; 
throat, breast, and sides under the wings, pale chestnut, 
or bay ; forehead, cheeks, line over, and strip through 
the eye, black ; crown, deep chestnut ; lower parts, dull 
yellowish white ; hind head and back, streaked with 
black, on a grayish buff ground ; wings, brownish 
black, crossed with tw r o bars of white ; tail, forked, 
brownish black, edged with ash, the three exterior 
feathers marked with a spot of white on their inner 
edges ; behind the eye is a broad oblong spot of 
yellowish 'white. The female has much less of the 
bay colour on the breast ; the black on the forehead is 
also less, and of a brownish tint. The legs and feet, in 
both, are dark ash, the claws, extremely sharp for 
climbing and hanging ; the bill is black ; irides, hazel. 
The ornithologists of Europe take no notice of this 
species, and have probably never met with it. Indeed, 
it is so seldom seen in this part of Pennsylvania, that 
few even of our own writers have mentioned it. 
I lately received a very neat drawing of this bird, 
done by a young lady in Middleton, Connecticut, where 
it seems also to be a rare species. 
