Vireo philadelphicus. BULLETIN OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. Vol. V. JANUARY, 1880. No. I. NOTES ON THE HABITS AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE PHILADELPHIA VIREO (VIREO PHILADELPHICUS). BY WILLIAM BREWSTER. The type specimen of this interesting little Vireo was obtained near Philadelphia, by Mr. Cassin, in September, 1842. For many years succeeding the publication of his description, in 1851, the species seems to have almost entirely eluded observation, and it was not until about the beginning of the last decade that the prob- lem of its distribution began to be solved, while there probably remains much to be learned regarding this point. We now know, however, that it extends over Eastern North America from Hud- son's Bay to Central America, while in certain portions of the Mississippi Valley it occurs regularly and in considerable numbers during the spring and fall migrations. Its breeding range does not seem to have been so well made out, but Mr. Nelson found one or two pairs near Chicago in July, 1874 (Bulletin Essex Institute, Vol. VIII, p. 102), and Professor Aughey gives it in his list of locust- eating birds as a summer resident in Eastern Nebraska (Notes on the Nature of the Food of the Birds of Nebraska, p. 27). This latter record appears to be the most western one for the United States. But it is more particularly of the history and distribution of the Philadelphia Vireo in our Eastern States, with a few original facts regarding its habits, that I wish to treat in the present article. Its title to a place in the fauna of New England was first established by Professor C. E. Hamlin, who took a single specimen at Water- VOL. V. 1