THE MOURNING WARBLER. ( Geothlypis philadelphia. )

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BASKETT, in his valuable "Story of the Birds," says that the warbler forms feed variously, but they use little vegetable matter. Some have ground-haunting, and even swamp-haunting habits; others have fringed tongues hinting of juices and nectars, while tree-trunk exploring, as in creepers, nuthatches, titmice, etc., also prevails. They have been described as at once the most fascinating and the most exasperating of birds. In the spring they come with a rush and although the woods may be full of them, only a faint lisp from the tree tops gives note of their presence, and unless you are a very good observer you will not know they are about at all. If you listen to other birds, instead of resolutely devoting yourself to warblers, you will lose the opportunity of the sight of a diminutive bird disappearing in a tree top. Some of the warblers dash about among the leaves on the ground hunting for gnats, others hunt over the branches of the trees, though some of them hop gaily on the ground, while others walk sedately, bobbing their heads or tilting their tails. The majority of the tribe fly northward to nest in pine forests. A few, however, remain and build in our parks, gardens and shrubbery. They are all insect-eaters, destroying ants, flies, caterpillars, larvÆ, plant lice, canker-worms, and May flies. They are therefore of great value in the protection of vegetation.

The mourning warbler, whose common name is black-throated ground warbler, has its habitat in eastern North America, breeding from northern United States northward; more rare in the Atlantic states. It winters in south-eastern Mexico, and Costa Rica, and thence south to Colombia. During the spring migration this bird is very common. Early in May, 1881, they were found in abundance near wheat lands in Indiana, most of them being observed about brush piles in a clearing, and along fences in the immediate vicinity. In the early part of June, 1871, a pair were seen in a thicket along the border of Fox Prairie, in Richland Co., Illinois, and it was presumed at the time that they were breeding there, but they may have been merely late migrants. It is known to breed in mountainous portions of Pennsylvania, New England, New York, Michigan, Minnesota, and eastern Nebraska, northward. It has been found nesting in Illinois south of latitude 39. Its nest is built on or near the ground in woods. One discovered by Burroughs in the state of New York was built in ferns about a foot from the ground, on the edge of a hemlock wood. It contained three eggs. The nests are usually composed of fine strips of bark and other fibrous material, lined with fine hair. The eggs are white, with a sprinkling of reddish dots near the larger ends.


The feeling that all life is one life slumbers in the child's soul. Only very gradually, however, can this slumbering feeling be transfigured into a waking consciousness. Slowly, through a sympathetic study of nature and of human life, through a growing sense of the soul and meaning of all natural facts and of all human relationships, and through recreating in various forms that external world which is but the objective expression of his own inmost being, the individual attains to a consciousness and unity of life and to a vision of the Eternal Fountain of Life.—The Nest.


                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

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