BLUE-WINGED YELLOW WARBLER. 167 
134. SYLVIA SOLITARIA , WILSON. 
BLUE-WINGED YELLOW WARBLER. 
WILSON, PLATE XV. FIG. IV. 
This bird lias been mistaken for the pine creeper of 
Catesby. It is a very different species. It comes to 
us early in May from the south ; haunts thickets and 
shrubberies, searching- the branches for insects ; is fond 
of visiting gardens, orchards, and willow trees, of 
gleaning among blossoms, and currant bushes ; and is 
frequently found in very sequestered woods, where it 
generally builds its nest. This is fixed in a thick bunch 
or tussock of long grass, sometimes sheltered by a brier 
bush. It is built in the form of an inverted cone, or 
funnel, the bottom thickly bedded with dry beech leaves, 
the sides formed of the dry bark of strong weeds, lined 
within with fine dry grass. These materials are not 
placed in the usual manner, circularly, but shelving 
downwards on all sides from the top ; the mouth being 
wide, the bottom very narrow, filled with leaves, and 
the eggs or young occupying the middle. The female 
lays five eggs, pure white, with a few very faint dots of 
reddish near the great end ; the young appear the first 
week in June. I am not certain whether they raise a 
second brood in the same season. 
I have met with several of these nests, always in a 
retired, though open part of the woods, and very similar 
to each other. 
The first specimen of this bird taken notice of by 
European writers was transmitted, with many others, 
by Mr William Bartram to Mr Edwards, by whom it 
was drawn and etched in the 277th plate of his Orni- 
thology. In his remarks on this bird, he seems at a 
loss to determine whether it is not the pine creeper of 
Catesby ;* a difficulty occasioned by the very imperfect 
colouring and figure of Catesby’s bird. The pine creeper. 
* Catesby, Car. vol. i, pi. 61. 
