t. One day while sitting on a log I saw one moving by short
flights through the trees and gradually nearing the ground. Its
movements were hurried and stealthy. About fifty yards from me it
disappeared behind some low brush, and had evidently alighted upon
the ground.

After waiting a few moments I cautiously walked in the direction.
When about halfway I accidentally made a slight noise, when the bird
flew up, and seeing me, hurried off out of the woods. Arrived at the
place, I found a simple nest of dry grass and leaves partially
concealed under a prostrate branch. I took it to be the nest of a
sparrow. There were three eggs in the nest, and one lying about a
foot below it as if it had been rolled out, as of course it had. It
suggested the thought that perhaps, when the cowbird finds the full
complement of eggs in a nest, it throws out one and deposits its own
instead. I revisited the nest a few days afterward and found an egg
again cast out, but none had been put in its place. The nest had
been abandoned by its owner and the eggs were stale.

In all cases where I have found this egg, I have observed both male
and female of the cowbird lingering near, the former uttering his
peculiar liquid, glassy note from the tops of the trees.

In July, the young which have been reared in the same neighborhood,
and which are now of a dull fawn color, begin to collect in small
flocks, which grow to be quite large in autumn.

The speckled Canada is a very superior warbler, having a lively,
animated strain, reminding you of certain parts of the canary's,
though quite broken and incomplete; the bird, the while, hopping
amid the branches with increased liveliness, and indulging in fine
sibilant chirps, too happy to keep silent.

His manners are quite marked. He has a habit of courtesying when he
discovers you which is very pretty. In form he is an elegant bird,
somewhat slender, his back of a bluish lead-color becoming nearly
black on his crown: the under part of his body, from his throat
down, is of a light, delicate yellow, with a belt of black dots
across his breast. He has a fine eye, surrounded by a light yellow
ring.

The parent birds are much disturbed by my presence, and keep up a
loud emphatic chirping, which attracts the attention of their
sympathetic neighbors, and one after another they come to see what
has happened. The chestnut-sided and the Blackburnian come in
company. The black and yellow warbler pauses a moment