THIS morning, May 5, as I walked through the fields the west wind brought to me a sweet, fresh odor, like that of fragrant violets, precisely like that of our little white sweet violet ( Viola blanda ). I do not know what it came from,— probably from sugar maples; just shaking out their fringe-like blossoms,—but it was the first breath of May, and very welcome. April has her odors, too, very delicate and suggestive, but seldom is the wind perfumed with the breath of actual bloom before May. I said it is Warbler time; the first arrivals of the pretty little migrants should be noted now. Hardly had my thought defined itself when before me, in a little hemlock, I caught the flash of a blue, white-barred wing; then glimpses of a yellow breast and a yellow crown. I approached cautiously, and in a moment more had a full view of one of our rarer Warblers, the Blue-winged Yellow Warbler. Very pretty he was, too, the yellow cap, the yellow breast, and the black streak through the eye being conspicuous features. lie would not stand to be looked at long, but soon disappeared in a near-by tree.

The Ruby-crowned Kinglet was piping in an evergreen tree near by, but him I had been hearing for several days. The Kinglets come before the first Warblers, and may be known to the attentive eye by their quick, nervous movements, and small greenish forms, and to the discerning ear by their hurried, musical, piping strains. How soft, how rapid, how joyous and lyrical their songs are! Very few country people, I imagine, either see them or hear them. The powers of observation of country people are not fine enough and trained enough. They see and hear coarsely. An object: must be big and a sound loud, to attract their attention. Have you seen and heard the Kinglet? If not, the finer inner world of nature is 0014 4 a sealed book to you. When your senses take in the Kinglet they will take in a thousand other objects that now escape you.

My first Warbler in the spring is usually the Yellow Redpoll, which I see in April. It is not a bird of the trees and woods. but of low bushes in the open, often alighting upon the ground in quest of food. I sometimes see it on the lawn. The last one I saw was one April day, when I went over to the creek to see if the suckers were yet running up. The bird was flitting amid the low bushes, now and then dropping down to the gravelly bank of the stream. Its chestnut crown and yellow under parts were noticeable.

The past season I saw for the first time the Golden-winged Warbler—a shy bird. that eluded me a long time in an old clearing that had grown up with low bushes. The song first attracted my attention, it is so like in form to that of the Black-throated Green Back, but in quality so inferior. The first distant glimpse of the bird, too, suggested the Green Back, so for a time I deceived myself with the notion that it was the Green Back with some defect in its vocal organs. A day or two later I heard two of them, and then concluded my inference was a hasty one.

Following one of the birds, I caught sight of its yellow crown, which is much more conspicuous than its yellow wing-bars. Its song is like this, 'n-'n de de de , with a peculiar reedy quality, but nor at all musical, falling far short of the clear, sweet, lyrical song of the Green Back.

One appreciates how bright and gay the plumage of many of our Warblers is, when he sees one of them alight upon the ground. While passing along a wood road in June, a male Black-throated Green came down out of the hemlocks and sat for a moment on the ground before me. How out of place he looked, like a bit of ribbon or millinery just dropped there! The throat of this Warbler always suggests the finest black velvet. Not long after I saw the Chestnut-sided Warbler do the same thing. We were trying to make it out in a tree by the roadside, when it dropped down quickly to the ground in pursuit of an insect, and sat a moment upon the brown surface, giving us a vivid sense of its bright new plumage.

When the leaves of the trees are just unfolding, or, as Tennyson says. “When all the woods stand in a mist of green, and nothing perfect,” the tide of migrating Warblers is at its height. They come in the night, and in the morning the trees are alive with them, The apple trees are just showing the pink, and how closely the birds inspect them in their eager quest for insect food! One cold, rainy day at this season Wilson's Black-cap,—a bird that is said to go north nearly to the arctic circle, explored an apple tree 0015 5 in front of my window. It came down within two feet of my face, as I stood by the pane, and paused a moment in its hurry and peered in at me, giving me an admirable view of its form and markings. It was wet and hungry, and it had a long journey before it. What a small body to cover such a distance!

The Black-poll Warbler, which one may see about the same time, is a much larger bird and of slower movement, and is colored much like the Black and White Creeping Warbler with a black cap on its head. The song of this bird is the finest, the least in volume, and most insect-like of that of any Warbler known to me. It is the song of the Black and White Creeper reduced, high and swelling in the middle and low and faint at its beginning and ending. When one has learned to note and discriminate the Warblers, he has made a good beginning in his or her ornithological studies.

With Photographs from Nature by the Author

DURING the winter of 1897–8 I prospected for Jurassic fossils in Carbon and Albany counties, Wyoming. When cold weather and snow rendered field work impracticable as well as very disagreeable, I made permanent camp for the winter at Aurora, Wyoming,—a mere station on the Union Pacific R. R., an old abandoned section-house serving as my winter quarters.

This part of Wyoming,—at all times dreary and lonely,—is strikingly so during winter months. Then snow fills the ravines and lends a level, prairie-like aspect to the landscape. I doubt if there is to be found anywhere a more desolate country

HORNED LARKS AND SNOWFLAKES

Among the various expedients to which I resorted for amusement, was photographing such birds as I could lure around the cabin. That I was not more successful in securing good negatives is due to the difficulties with which I had to contend. Chief of these were the 0025 15 fierce, wintry blasts sweeping over the plains and filling the air with snow and dust.

A single experiment taught me the inadvisability of leaving the camera exposed for any length of time to these conditions. I had been trying to get a large photograph of Horned Larks. The camera was placed on the ground and a handful of oats scattered before it,

HORNED LARKS AND SNOWFLAKES

By throwing oats on only one spot, and that close to the window, I soon gathered quite a flock of Horned Larks, who came regularly every morning to feed from the constantly replenished supply. Finally, after a week of gloomy, dark weather, a cloudless sky offered especially good chances for a photograph of my feathered friends. This time I placed the camera on the window-sill. Maneuvres attendant upon focusing and inserting a plate-holder, of course, 0026 16 frightened the birds away. They were back again within a few minutes, but an unexpected source of annoyance interfered. A freight train stopped opposite the scene of my operations and belched great billows of smoke between the sun and the birds. Also the shadow of the cabin was gradually encroaching on the feeding ground. I made a trial exposure, however, and obtained a very good negative. But a shadow in the foreground and a wagon tongue in the rear, did not add to the pictorial effect of the group.

After much pulling and prying, I pushed the objectionable wagon out of the drifts, and put off further photographing until the next morning. The morning came as bright and sunny as I desired. My

YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRDS

A few Yellow-headed Blackbirds were attracted by the food supply I furnished, and I made several negatives of them. The Yellow-heads were more wary than the Horned Larks, and flew away at the slightest disturbance. Only a few at a time gathered beneath the window, while the others perched on fence-posts at a safe distance and kept watch.

But it remained for a Northern Shrike to add ‘insult to injury,’ by seizing a dead mouse I had placed on a post and alighting on the camera with its capture!

( See frontispiece )

ON the morning of May 27, 1897, equipped with au extra supply of patience and a 5 × 7 ‘Premo B’ camera fitted with rapid rectilinear lens, my plateholders filled with unexposed plates, and accompanied by my wife, who has been a partner in all of my successful trips, I started for Otter Lake, Cayuga County, N. Y.

It was a beautiful morning, with not a breath of air stirring (by the way, this is the hardest of all things to control, and is an absolute necessity if you are to make fine, clear-cut negatives of birds and their natural surroundings), and the lake looked like a mirror. It took but a minute to get the large, flat-bottomed row-boat ready for the start, and we were soon gliding along, an oar's-length from shore. scanning every tree, bush, and bunch of rushes, in search of nests, those of the Red-winged Blackbird being very plenty and placed both in bushes or rushes in about equal numbers. A pair of Kingbirds had selected as the place for their summer home. a large, low willow limb which projected over the water; a peep into the nest revealed three eggs, common, yet so beautiful in their bed of wool and feathers.

Our next finds were several nests of a pair of Long-billed Marsh Wrens, which looked more like mouse-nests than anything else I have in mind. As we could return to these later, if unable to find anything better, we had not yet exposed a single plate, reserving them for a rare or unusual find.

We were in search of nests of the Least Bittern, and as we were passing that part of the shore where they always nested, we soon located a nest, but as it only contained one egg, another nest must be found. A male Least Bittern flew up a short distance ahead of us and ‘dropped in’ back of the bushes. We rowed down to the place from which he flushed, and standing up in the boat looked around, and not more than a boat's-length ahead, we espied a female sitting on a nest. I pushed the boat very carefully to within a couple of feet of the nest, and prepared to make an exposure. The camera was set to focus on an object 34 inches from cap of lens. and I moved it back and forth until the focus was perfect, the diaphragm was closed to f 16, and an instantaneous exposure with speed at 1/25″ was made.

As most of my operations, preparatory to making the exposure, were of necessity carried on within three feet of the bird on the nest, 0052 40 she at several times started to leave it; but when the bird moved I kept still. and when she kept still I worked; in this way I finally completed my preparations. The peep I got of the eggs as she partly raised off from them, just as I finished, made me squeeze the bulb before I intended to; but the result I obtained fully satisfied me, for in no other way could I describe the results of this trip, and what I saw and learned of the habits and home-life of the Least Bittern.

I SHOULD like to say a few words to the readers of Bird-Lore on the subject of making good photographs of birds. Don't conclude at once, when you see pictures of nests, or birds in their wild state, that it is an easy matter to get them. A year ago, when I saw the fine exhibition of slides presented by Mr. Brewster and Mr. Chapman at the American Ornithologists' meeting, I at once concluded that it would be an easy thing for me to get similar results. So I forthwith invested much good money in purchasing a camera, and all the accompanying outfit; but not until I had worried all my photographic friends for advice of all kinds. With all the confidence of an expert I started on this unknown sea, and I must confess to you, patient reader, that my efforts were a brilliant string of failures, for from the more than one hundred and twenty-five plates that I exposed, I succeeded in getting only two good negatives. But I had lots of fun and plenty of experience, and am just as proud of my two good negatives as the celebrated old hen that had but one chick. If you want to learn to be patient and persevering, try photographing in the fields and woods. If you wish to learn more of the habits of birds than you can in any other possible way, try for hours to get them familiar enough with you and your camera to go on with their nest-building, or feeding their nestlings. Besides all this, in later days, whenever you see the photograph, it will recall to you every pleasant moment that you spent in getting the negative.

That you may share with me some of the pleasures that I experienced in getting a negative of a nest of eggs, from which the accompanying picture was made, let me tell you the following story about the Great Northern Diver, more commonly known as the Loon, and among the scientists as Gavia imber .

Those of you who are familiar with the Adirondack or Canada lakes can easily picture the surroundings of this nest, which I found in Higley Lake, Canada. This is a small body of water, hardly more than a very large pond. This section of Canada may be called a lake region, and is very beautiful. Most of the lakes are surrounded with forests, in which the contrasting colors of the evergreens and white birches add greatly to the natural beauty of the scenery. This nest was built in very shallow water, about eight feet from the shore. It was, at its base. about twenty inches in diameter, and at its apex about fifteen inches wide. It was about nine inches above the water at its greatest height. and composed entirely of mud, so far as I could determine, of a very dark color, The water where it was placed was not over six or eight inches deep, but it was really a very hard matter to determine exactly where' the water ended and the mud commenced. This I ascertained to my sorrow and discomfiture when I undertook to set up my tripod. Standing in a very round-bottomed boat and trying to plant a tripod in silt of seemingly unfathomable depth is no easy job, as I found out. Finally, however. I succeeded in getting what I now have the pleasure of showing you: but I dare not tell you of the beautiful failures I made before this picture was obtained. When I first discovered the nest, the Loon was upon it, but as soon as she saw me she slid off into the lake and made every effort to dive. It is true that her head was under the water, but her back was not until she had gone some feet from the nest out into the lake, where the water was deep enough to entirely cover her. She did not then appear until she was well across the pond, where she was joined by her mate. The nest contained only one egg when I first saw it; but in the water, on the lake side of the nest, I found another egg, which the mother bird had evidently rolled ont of the nest. perhaps in her fright and hasty departure when she first saw me. This egg I replaced in the nest by lifting it with the broad end of the boat oar, thinking, perhaps, that handling it might cause the Loon to desert the nest. The egg that was in the water was many shades lighter in color than the one found in the nest, which leads me to believe that the eggs of birds that habitually breed in damp mud nests acquire a darker color from stains.

In another pond of about the same size, and within half a mile of Higley Lake, I subsequently saw a pair of Loons that had but one young, so far as I could ascertain. If there was another it was kept well hidden. I was very much interested in watching the methods by which the old birds kept the little fellow out of 0054 42 danger. When I first saw the family group, both parents and the little one were together; but immediately on the appearance of my boat the whole group disappeared under the surface. The young bird soon came to the surface again in about the same spot, both parents were some distance off on the other side of the boat, so that I was between them. Both parents were perfectly quiet until I undertook to row toward their offspring, when

NEST AND EGGS OF LOON Photographed from Nature, by William Dutcher

A few weeks later the same group acted in an entirely different manner; then they remained together, and as the boat approached, the old bird with its bill seemed to push the young one under the water before it dove itself.

If this bit of the domestic life of these two Loon families has interested you as much as it did me, I shall feel amply repaid for the thirty-two miles I had to drive each time I visited them.

With Photographs from Nature by the Author.

During the severe cold of January and February, 1895, most of the Bluebirds were thought to have perished. So it is with the spirit of a genuine Audubon that we hail their return in ever increasing numbers each succeeding springs. How sadly we should miss these little friends may be judged by the great commotion among ornithologists caused by their supposed extinction. In order to have more than a mere remembrance of their habits, I set out one day in the summer of 1898, at Decorah, Iowa, to obtain photographs of them in their haunts, and secured two interesting negatives of the female, as shown

BLUEBIRD FLYING TO NEST

After focusing my camera to within three feet of the post, and arranging a string attachment, I concealed myself in some bushes about seventy-five feet away. I waited patiently for ten minutes

BLUEBIRD AT NEST

A knowledge of the bird's nesting habits is a prime requisite in avian photography. Much patience is needed, as failures are very numerous. A camera which may be focussed to within two or three feet is an absolute necessity in order to make the picture large enough. Most of my failures have been caused by the lack of bright sunlight, under-exposure, or movement of the bird the instant the picture was taken; but one good photograph is sufficient reward for many trials.

THE cold wave reached us at Miami, on Biscayne Bay, Florida, in the night of February 12, 1899. It was preceded by severe thunder storms in the evening. On the 13th, Monday, it was very cold all over the state, with snow and sleet as far south as Ormond and Titusville. Our thermometers at Miami ranged from 36° to 40° during the day. As I sat in my room at the hotel, about four in the afternoon, I saw a bird outside my window, then another and another, and soon the air seemed full of wings.

Opening my window to see what the visitors could be, I found they were Tree Swallows ( Tachycineta bicolor ). Several flew into my room, others clustered on the window ledge, huddling closely together for warmth. There were hundreds of them about the house seeking shelter and warmth. They crept in behind the window blinds, came into open windows, huddled together by dozens on cornices and sills. They were quite fearless; once I held my hand outside and two of them lighted on its palm and sat there quietly. As it grew dark and colder their numbers increased. They flew about the halls and perched in corners, and the whole house was alive with them. Few of the guests in the hotel knew what they were; some even called them ‘bats,’ and were afraid they might fly into their faces or become entangled in their hair. One man informed those about him that they were Humming Birds, ‘the large kind, you know,’ but all were full of sympathy for the beautiful little creatures, out in the cold and darkness. A few were taken indoors and sheltered through the night, but ‘what were these among so many?’

The next morning the sun shone brightly though the weather was still very cold—the mercury had fallen below 30° during the night. But as I raised the shade of one of my eastern windows I saw a half-dozen of the Swallows sitting upon the ledge in the sunshine, while the air seemed again filled with flashing wings. I was so relieved and glad. Surely the tiny creatures, with their tints of steely blue or shining green contrasting with the pure white of the under parts, were more hardy than i had feared. But alas! it was but a remnant that escaped. Hundreds were found dead. Men were sent out with baskets to gather the limp little bodies from piazzas, window ledges, and copings. It was a pitiful sight for St. Valentine Day, when, as the old song has it,

“The birds are all choosing their mates.”

CLOUD CAP INN, the loghouse hotel fastened down with cables high on the north side of Mount Hood, is too near timber-line to claim a great variety of feathered guests, but Oregon Jays and Clark's Crows or Nutcrackers are regular pensioners of the house. The usual shooting by tourists does not menace them, for the nature-loving mountaineers, who keep the Inn and act as guides to the summit, guard most loyally both birds and beasts. They like to tell of a noble Eagle which used to fly up the cañon and circle over the glacier every day, and they recall with pleasure the snowy morning when an old Blue Grouse brought her brood to the Inn, and the birds ate the wheat that was thrown them with the confidence of chickens. The Grouse were, apparently, regular neighbors of the Inn, and while there I had the pleasure of seeing a grown family. They fed on the slope closed above me with the unconcern of domestic fowls, conversing in turkey-like monosyllables as they moved about, and two of them came within a few feet and looked up at me—that not forty rods from the Inn! The pleasure of the sight was doubled by the reflection that such things could be so near a hotel, even on a remote mountain.

It was delightful to see how familiarly birds gathered about the house. You could sit in the front doorway and when not absorbed in looking off on the three wonderful snow peaks—St. Helens, Rainier, and Adams—rising above the Cascade range, could watch Oregon Juncos, Steller's Jays, Oregon Jays and Nutcrackers coming down to drink at the hydrant twenty feet away; while the Ruby Kinglet and White-crowned 0059 47 Sparrow, together with Townsend's Solitaire and other interesting westerners, moved about in the branches of the low timber-line pines; and Lewis' woodpeckers, with their long, powerful flights, crossed over the forested cañons below. Crossbills had stayed around the souse sociably for three weeks together, Mrs. Langille, the noble old mother of the mountaineers, told me. She said they would fly against the logs of the house and call till she went out to feed them. They left with the first heavy storms, though usually, she said: “That's the time when we have birds come around the house—when there are storms.” And a friendly hospice the feathered way-farers find it so long as the Inn is open!

The Oregon Jays and Clark's Crows are, as I said, the regular pensioners of the house. The Jays look very much like their relatives the Canada Jays, but are darker, and when you are close to them the feathers of their

CLARK'S CROW

When I was at the Inn, the Chinese cook used to throw scraps from the table over the lava cliff, and both Crows and Jays spent most of their time carrying if off. As the foot of the cliff was one of the best places to watch them, I spent part of every day there, and when the smell of coffee grounds got too strong, consoled myself by looking through the trees up at the grand white peak of Hood.

It was interesting to see the difference in the ways of the two birds. The Nutcracker would fly down to the rocks with rattling wings, and, when not too hungry to be critical, would proceed to investigate the breakfast with the air of a judge on the bench, for 0060 48 he is a dignified character. To touch the hem of his robe to the food would have been defilement, so he went about pressing his wings tight to his sides, sometimes giving them a little nervous shake. To smile at this sober-minded person seems most disrespectful, but the solemnity of his gambols was surely provocative of mirth. Not content with turnings his long-billed head judicially from side to side as he advanced through the scraps, if the biscuit on his left was not to his mind, with one great ungainly leap he would box half the compass and plant his big feet before a potato on his right. This he would proceed to probed with a grave air of interrogation, and if he decided the case in the negative would withdraw his beak and pass to the next case on the docket. Once when the potato was a half a waffle, he pried it up tentatively with his long bill, and at last, deciding in its favor, proceeded to fly off with it, his long legs dangling ludicrously behind him.

The Oregon Jays were quite unlike their Crow cousins. They would come flying in, talking together in sociable fashion, and drop down so noiselessly you could but be struck by the difference between fluffy owl-like feathers and stiff quills. Sometimes one of the Jays would touch the side of a tree a moment before dropping lightly to the ground. All their motions were quick and easy, if not actually graceful, and they worked rapidly, with none of the profound deliberation shown at times by the Nutcracker. The smaller pieces of food they ate; the larger ones they carried off, usually in their bills, occasionally in their claws. In eating, the Jay would

OREGON JAY

( To be concluded .)

( See Frontispiece )

GANNETS ( Sula bassana ) are known to nest in only three places in North America—Perroquet Island, the Bird Rocks, and Bonaventure Island, all in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. By far the largest colony is found on the last named island, where, on the ledges of the red sandstone cliffs, some three hundred feet in height, they are practically secure from molestation. Bonaventure Island itself, however, is the most accessible of the three localities mentioned, and may be easily reached in a small fishing boat from the neighboring village of Percé, where the famous Percé Rock, with its colony of Herring Gulls and Double-crested Cormorants, makes the region particularly interesting to the ornithologist.

The Gannet cliffs are on the east side of Bonaventure, and are exposed to the full force of the sea. To visit them satisfactorily, therefore, one should select a calm day, when one may closely approach the cliffs, and view with both safety and comfort the long, white rows, containing thousands of birds nesting on the shelves and ledges on the face of the cliff; a remarkable spectacle!

The unusually turbulent sea which prevailed during my visit to these cliffs, on July 11, 1898, prevented me from securing satisfactory pictures from a boat, but, landing on the west side of Bonaventure, I crossed the island (here about one and a half miles in width), and reached a position on the crest of the cliffs, from which the accompanying picture was made. About four hundred Gannets are shown nesting on this single ledge—one of many quite as densely populated. Preparations were made to secure a picture of these birds on the wing, but my best efforts to startle them into flight did not succeed in making a single bird leave its nest!

( Concluded from page 48 )

ALTHOUGH the Nutcrackers and Jays were masters of the feast, they did not altogether monopolize it. Ground squirrels with golden brown heads and striped backs would look out at me from the rocks, and pretty little striped-nosed chipmunks would pick up choice morsels and climb nimbly back along the cliff with them. Juncos often dropped in, pecked indifferently at the crumbs, slipped off the tin cans they tried to perch on, and flew off. Two Lewis' Woodpeckers stopped one day and, flying down, clung awkwardly to the side of the cliff, as if vaguely wanting to join in the proceedings, but not knowing how, finally left. A single Steller's Jay hung around the outskirts in the same way, the first day I was there. He hopped about, looked this way and that, and pecked at the food perfunctorily, as if it was new to his palate and not quite to his mind, acting altogether as if he realized that something was going on he ought to be enjoying, though he really didn't see just where the fun came in. Unlike the Woodpeckers, however, he was determined to improve his opportunities, and cultivated his appetite so successfully that on the last day when I visited the dining-room he and a comrade were working away, apparently enjoying the viands as much as their neighbors.

But the Crows and Oregon Jays were the regular habitues of the place. When resting from his labors a solitary Crow would often perch on the tip of a bare spar on the crest of the cliff, apparently quite satisfied with his own society, but I never say a Jay there, and one whom I did see separated from his band for a moment fairly made the welkin ring with shouts for his clan. Several Clark's Crows were often at the table with the Jays, but while I never saw a Crow disturb a Jay, a Crow would often fly with animation at a newcoming fellow Crow. This was a surprise to me, for on Mt. Shasta I has seen the Nutcrackers hunting in bands quite as the Jays did here. But on the wide lava slopes of Shasta there were, doubtless, 0087 73 grasshoppers enough for all the world, while here the feast was restricted to the foot of one cliff on the mountain—quite a different matter. When I spoke to Mrs. Langille about this difference in disposition, she acquiesced as if it were an old story to her, unhesitatingly denominating the Jays ‘generous fellows,’ and the Crows ‘greedy’ ones.

One Crow made a special exhibition of egoistic tendencies. He was engaged in hurriedly carrying off future breakfasts for himself when a party of brother Crows appeared. He had been working with absorption, flying back and forth to the table with eager haste, being gone less than half a minute at a time, but on the arrival of his friends dropped his work and devoted himself to driving them from the field. Not content with keeping them from the table, he flew at them with a strange note of ominous warning when they sat quietly in the tree-tops. It seemed as if he were nervous lest they discover what he had been storing among the branches. When he had fairly routed the enemy he apparently acted on his fear of discovery, for, instead of placing his supplies near at hand as before, he flew out of sight with them. As before, he worked with nervous haste. As I looked down on the tree-tops from above it was impossible to see where he put all the food, but several times when he flew up in sight he seemed to be sticking small bits between the needles of the pines. As the bunches of needles are compact and stiff in this white-barked pine ( Pinus albicaulis ), this might be a safe temporary cache, but the winter gales that make it necessary to hold down the Inn with huge cables would presumably leave little biscuit between the needles of a pine.

The question is, do these birds—and others which hoard—really use their stores? The testimony of all who are in the field in winter is needed to clear up the matter. The first point to be determined is whether the individual birds winter where they store. The Nutcrackers, Mr. Langille informed me, do remain at the high altitudes all the year. As he said, it is stormy indeed when they cannot be seen sailing across the caéons or perched on the topmost branches of the trees, screaming and calling in their harsh way, always restless and seeming to resent any intrusion of man, beast, 0088 74 or fowl. On the other hand, he said that the Jays seldom remain at the high altitudes during the winter months, usually descending to lower elevations, where they flit about in flocks of from six to twenty, sounding their plaintive varied notes and whistles at all times.

Nevertheless, the storing of the Crows at this altitude was certainly much less systematic than that of the Jays. The Jays' movements were easy to follow, for they were concerted and regular. The Inn was on a ridge between two cañons, and commanded the birds' pathway. A ban would come up from under the cliff at the top of the western cañon, cross over the ridge, and drop down into the eastern cañon, where they would fly over the tops of the firs

CLARK'S CROW Photographed from nature by Walter K. Fisher

The Jays talked a good deal in going back and forth, and their notes were pleasantly varied. One call was remarkably like the chirp of a Robin. Another of the commonest was a weak and rather complaining cry, repeated several times; and a sharply contrasting one was a pure, clear whistle of one note followed by a three-syllabled call, something like ka-wé-ah . The regular rallying cry was still different, a loud and striking two-syllabled ka-wheé . The notes of Clark's Crow often suggested the rattling of the Red-headed Woodpecker. The bird had a variety of kerring , throaty notes, and when disturbed, as at the unexpected sight of me at its dining-room, gave a loud, warning quarr . Besides these Woodpecker-like calls, it has a squawking cry similar to that of Steller's Jay.

The voices of the birds were often heard from the house as they got water from the hydrant in front of the Inn, the Jays frequently stopping on the way back from their cañon storehouse. Sometimes 0089 75 three Jays would suddenly appear overhead, drop noiselessly to the pool under the hydrant, and squatting close together fill their bills and then raise their heads to swallow. Though the Jays usually went to the pool for water, they would sometimes light on the hydrant and, leaning over-drink from the faucet, which Mrs. Langille always left dripping for their benefit. The Clark's Crows, so far as I noticed, always drank right from the faucet.

It was hard to get photographs of the birds at the hydrant, as they stopped only in passing, but as it was impossible to take them under the cliff on account of the poor light, I determined to bait them. Finding a number of the Nutcrackers in front of the kitchen window, I asked the Chinaman for some meat for them, holding up my kodak to explain that I wanted to take the birds' pictures. To my surprise, the man promptly and decidedly shook his head! I didn't know what to make of such apparent rudeness at first, but if finally dawned on me that he could not understand English and, not being an ornithologist, from past experience with tourist cameras concluded that I wanted his picture! Accordingly, nothing daunted, I appealed to Mrs. Langille, and when she gave me a plate of suet, returned to take the Crows. They flew at my approach, but quickly settled back and fairly fell on the meat I put in the road for them. I got a snap of one with a big mouthful. After taking all the Nutcrackers I wanted, I went back to the hydrant to wait for the Jays, but the Crows followed and one fellow fairly gorged himself on the fat. He gulped it down so fast I had to drive him off in order to have either meat or films left for the Jays. It was hard to persuade him that I wanted him to leave. He had no experience of such inhospitality. Mild shooing did no good. I actually had to throw small stones at him before he would take the hint! When he finally started to go, I got his picture as he turned and looked regretfully over his shoulder at the Jay he was leaving in possession of the field.

The Jays were even more fearless than the Crows. Several of them would often be on the ground at once, but they ate so fast and flew back and forth so rapidly that it was hard to focus on them quickly enough to get their most interesting poses. I put a 0090 76 brown paper behind or under the pan for a lighter background, and at first the birds hopped nervously when it moved, but they soon got used to it, and ate on it and on the pan, as it happened. And how they did stuff! They were so absorbed that, although I sat within four feet of the pan, they sometimes came too near for me to focus. They paid so little heed to my presence I have no doubt they would have eaten from my hand had I not been engaged in keeping them at a proper distance. When the raw meat was gone Mrs. Langille gave me a supply of cooked fat, and it was astonishing to see how much of the greasy stuff they could swallow. I caught one just as he was about to fly off with a billful of it. The fat seemed to make them thirsty; they had to go to the hydrant to wash it down with cold water.

Meat Hawk, the name the mountaineers have for them, is

CLARK'S CROW Photographed from nature by Walter K. Fisher

On Mount Shasta, although the Nutcrackers came about camp, they showed no desire for camp food, and on Hood Mr. Langille informed me that the Crows tamed this year were the first they had ever succeeded in coaxing about. After I left the mountain they became still more familiar, and, I am told, would gather in the trees at daybreak and call until the family went out to feed them.

I came to the woods in the dead of the year, I saw the wing'd sprite thro' the green-brier peeping: “Darling of Winter, you've nothing to fear, Though the branches are bare and the cold earth is sleeping!”

With a dee, dee, dee! the sprite seemed to say, “I'm friends with the Maytime as well as December, And I'11 meet you here on a fair-weather day; Here, in the green-brier thicket,—remember!”

I came to the woods in the spring of the year, And I followed a voice that was most entreating: Phebe! Phebe! (and yet more near), Phebe! Phebe! it kept repeating!

I gave up the search, when, not far away, I saw the wing'd sprite thro' the green-brier peeping, With Phebe! Phebe! that seemed to say, “I told you so! and my promise I'm keeping.”

“You'll know me again, when you meet me here, Whether you come in December or Maytime: I've a dee, dee, dee! for the Winter's ear, And a Phebe! Phebe! for Spring and Playtime!”

As sable night fades into soft rose tint, Through leafy aisles slow filters daylight's glint; From green tree arch is faintly heard the call Which summons quickly feathered choir all To Nature's vast cathedral, where in song Unite the worshippers, a feathered throng. What harmonies pour forth from each bird throat! A morning prayer ascends with each clear note.

NEAR BOONTON, N. J., it was my good fortune last summer to have the exceptional opportunity of watching closely the rearing of a family of Chimney Swifts. The nest was built opposite and slightly above an opening in the chimney designed for the insertion of a stovepipe. The opening was about two feet from the floor of a second-story room in the house where I spent the summer.

When discovered, the nest was only partially completed, so it was necessary to exercise care, lest the birds become alarmed and choose a more secluded spot. To guard against disturbance to them, a black cloth was hung over the opening in such a way that it could be carefully and noiselessly lifted during periods of observation. Although the room was used as a bedchamber throughout the summer, the Swifts never seemed to be annoyed by the close proximity of their human neighbors. They were of a trustful disposition, and soon became accustomed to being watched. Occasionally, when I looked in upon them at the beginning of on acquaintance, they would spread their long, beautifully formed wings and lift them gracefully above the back, as if intending to fly, but usually, upon second consideration, would conclude it was unnecessary.

It was the 21st of May when I first peeped in upon the little bracket against the chimney wall that became the stage for the enactment of scenes filled with absorbing interest to me in the weeks that followed. It was not placed in an angle, but against the north side of the flue, beneath a slight projection formed by an accumulation of soot.

In a week one egg was apparent, but there may have been others, for the little builders had been adding one twig after another to the front edge of the nest, so that it had become impossible to see the bottom. Two more days passed, after which it could be seen that there were at least two eggs, and yet the structure continued to be enlarged.

June 5 marked the beginning of incubation. In mid-afternoon of this day I saw the sitting bird had flown, and, going out-of-doors to study birds, my attention was attracted to a Swift flying among the branches of the locust trees near by. This was an unusual sight to me, and, recalling that I had read that Swifts never alight in trees, I watched eagerly to see what it might mean. Soon I saw that the 0093 79 bird was snatching at little dry twigs. She flew round and round, and presently was gone. Suspecting that it was my little friend, I ran quickly upstairs, and sure enough, there sat my bird upon the nest, with a twig in her mouth, panting as if tired by extra exertion. Resting a moment, she proceeded to apply the salivary glue and adjust the twig, and then settled again to the task of sitting.

After a few days there came a cold storm, and it was believed that the little brooder proved unfaithful to her duties, for late one evening and early the following morning she was seen huddled with others of her kind beneath the nest. Great were my fears that no birds would ever come from these chilled eggs, but time made it clear that the tiny creature knew what she was doing. This was the sole act of parental neglect that was apparent during all the weeks required to rear the family. Under date of June 17, I noted that the eggs were constantly protected. At whatever time of day I looked I saw a sitting bird.

June 24 dawned fair and warm. As was my custom, I called to say “good morning” into the chimney before going down to breakfast, when I found that there was excitement in the little home. A faint peep reached my ear, which caused the mother anxious restlessness each time it was repeated. From half-past eight until ten o'clock that morning I sat at my post of observation, during which time it appeared that two or three more young were hatched, for there was much peeping on the part of the little ones and much fidgeting about by the adults. Two shells, or parts of shells, were tossed from the nest. Occasionally the parents exchanged places, one brooding the infants while the other went out into the air. Even at the tender age that must be reckoned by minutes, these young birds were fed, seemingly, by regurgitation.

During the progress of my study I found that one of the pair, which from manners and appearance f judged to be the female, had lost a tail feather, and this one I affectionately dubbed “Swiftie.” She appeared worn out with anxiety added to the confinement of a long period of incubation, and embraced every opportunity to rest, but seasons of sleep were of short duration, for it seemed that the body of the brooding bird was lifted each time a movement was felt beneath. The mate, with his sleek coat, bright eyes and calm demeanor, formed a decided contrast to the ragged, unkempt appearance of the female.

Even four days showed perceptible growth in the swiftlings. They were not allowed to remain uncovered, a wise precaution, for their bodies were perfectly naked. At this age the instinct of cleanliness began to assert itself. The weak, awkward little creatures would 0094 80 struggle backward from beneath the brooder, up to the edge of the nest and deposit over it that which, remaining within, would have made their home uninhabitable.

From this time forth a third Swift was seen to enter into the care of the nestlings, taking its turn at brooding and feeding. Was this a nurse-maid employed to relieve the overburdened mother, or a kind and helpful friend or neighbor, or the younger and less care-taking of two wives? Who can tell?

It was not until the sixth day after hatching that I knew to a certainty how many young birds there were. Then, to my surprise, I found there were five. They had grown to be very clamorous for food. Two, at most three (later but one), were served at one feeding, and the process was after this manner: “Swiftie” would drop into the chimney and alight below the nest, her throat bulging with the fullness of captured insects. The little ones that were hungry were alert, for all had learned that a rumbling noise in the chimney, followed by a sound of “chitter, chitter, chitter,” meant something to eat. After resting a moment, the mother would scramble up over the nest, and, with closed eyes, feel about until she came in contact with an open mouth, whereupon she would place her beak far down the throat, deposit a portion of food, then seek another yawning cavity. No system appeared to be observed in the matter of feeding. The hungriest youngsters made the greatest effort to reach the source of supply.

July 1 feathers began to appear. They grew rapidly, especially those of wings and tail, and in a week the bodies were about covered. With feathers came employment, for they must often be dressed, though from a habit of yawning frequently, common to the family, one might be led to believe that time hung heavily on their claws.

The nestlings were two weeks old before the eyes began to open, and nearly three before they were much used. But when they were fully open, and the feathers had grown out and were fast becoming sooty instead of black, how winning these young birds appeared!

The time had now come to take up exercises preparatory to flying. The young aspirants would stand in the nest and for a time vibrate the wings rapidly, so rapidly that the identity of wing was lost. Two first ventured from home when nineteen days old, clinging to the wall for a short time a few inches from the nest.

One afternoon about this time there came a severe and prolonged shower. The rain beat into the chimney, reaching down to the nest. What now did I see? Besides the five grown-up swiftlings, the three adults, packed in and upon the nest, the ram dripping from 0095 81 those which were exposed. I mention this incident to give an idea of the adhesiveness of the glue used in the construction of Swifts' nests.

July 20 I made the following note: “Swiftlings no longer make use of the nest, but dispose themselves in various parts of the chimney, sometimes in a cluster, sometimes in twos or threes, and sometimes separately. The take flying exercises up and down the chimney, but I believe have not yet left it.” The next morning I was forced to conclude that three had taken flight into the great outsit world, for upon looking the chimney over thoroughly with the aid of a small mirror, I could find but two birds.

The chimney was much used by this interesting family until the 24th of August. Early in the morning of that day a large number of Swifts were seen gathering in a flock at a short distance from the house. Ten o'clock that night I searched the chimney with a lighted candle, but found no sign to life, and I believe that the Swifts did not again enter within its walls.

RIGHT out on the sandy beach, just above high tide, the Black Skimmer risks her set of eggs, and, while apparently unprotected, they are so much the color of the sand and surrounding shells and seaweed that they would not be notice unless you were especially looking for them.

The Skimmers are gull-like in form, with long, slender body and long wings, spreading almost three feet. They have a glossy black back, white breast, orange feet, and a most curiously shaped orange bill, which is almost as thin as a knife, the thin edges closing vertically together. This peculiarity has given the bird the name of ‘Razor Bill.’

Their graceful and regular flight can hardly be mistaken for that of any other bird. They skim just over the surface of the water, following the contour of the waves, while the lower mandible of their 0096 82 bill, which is longer than the upper, projects below the surface of the water, and when it comes in contact with a small fish, the latter simply slide up the narrow, inclined plane into the Skimmer's mouth.

Formerly they bred in great numbers along the eastern coast of our Middle and Southern Atlantic states, and only a few years ago

NEST AND EGGS OF BLACK SKIMMER

As the eggs are entirely exposed, the parents are relieved to some extent from the duty of incubation by the heat of the sun, and as soon as the young hatch they run about like chickens.

After getting two good pictures of the Skimmers and her eggs, I turned my attention to a Gull-billed Tern, and while standing over

GULL-BILLED TERN

With Photographs from nature by Blanche-Kendall

HIS range being southern, Cardinal Grosbeak seldom travels through New England; and, to my knowledge, has never established a home and reared a family north of Connecticut until in the instance here recorded. Kentuckians claim him, and with some show of right, since James Lane Allen built his monument in imperishable prose. But, soon or late, all notables come to Boston, and among them may now be registered the “Kentucky Cardinal.”

Shy by nature, conspicuous in plumage, he shuns publicity; and, avoiding the main lines of travel, he put up at a quiet country house in a Boston suburb—Brookline.

Here, one October day in 1897, among the migrants stopping at this half-way house, appeared a distinguished guest, clad in red, with a black mask, a light red bill, and a striking crest; with him a bird so like him that they might have been called the two Dromios. After a few days, the double passed on and left our hero the only red-coat in the field. A White-throated Sparrow now arrived from the mountains, and a Damon and Pythias friendship sprang up between the birds. Having decided to winter at the North, they took lodgings in a spruce tree, and came regularly to the table d'hote on the porch. My lord Cardinal, being the more distinguished guest, met with particular favor, and soon became welcome at the homes of the neighborhood. With truly catholic taste, he refused creature comforts from none, but showed preference for his first abode.

It was March 5, 1898, when we kept our first appointment with the Cardinal. A light snow had fallen during the night, and the air was keen, without premonition of spring. It was a day for home-keeping birds, the earth larder being closed. The most delicate tact was required in presenting strangers. A loud, clear summons,—the Cardinal's own whistle echoed by human lips—soon brought a response. Into the syringa bush near the porch flew, with a whir and a sharp tsip , a bird. How gorgeous he looked in the snow-laden shrub! For an instant the syringa blossoms loaded the air with fragrance as a dream of summer floated by. Then a call to the porch was met by several sallies and quick retreats, while the wary bird studied the newcomers. Reassuring tones from his gentle hostess, accompanied by the rattle of nuts and seeds, at last prevailed, and the Cardinal flew to the railing and looked us over with keen, inquiring eye. Convinced 0098 84 that no hostilities were intended, he gave a long, trustful look into the face of his benefactress and flew to her feet.

A gray squirrel frisking by stopped at the lunch-counter and seized an ‘Educator’ cracker.

The novel sensation of uncaged bird within touch, where one might note the lovely shading of his plumage as one notes a flower, was memorable; but a sweeter surprise was in store. As we left the house, having made obedience to his eminence the Cardinal, the bird

CARDINAL AND GRAY SQUIRREL

As March advanced, several changes in the Cardinal were noted by his ever-watchful friends. He made longer trips abroad, returning tired and hungry. The restlessness of the unsatisfied heart was plainly his. His long, sweet, interpolating whistle, variously rendering 0099 85 “Peace…peace…peace!” “Three cheers, three cheers,” etc., to these sympathetic northern ears became “Louise, Louise, Louise!” Thenceforth he was Louis, the Cardinal, calling for his mate.

On March 26, a kind friend took pity on the lonely bachelor, and a caged bird, “Louise,” was introduced to him. In the lovely dove-colored bird, with faint washings of red and the family mask and crest, the Cardinal at once recognized his kind. His joy was unbounded; and acquaintance progressed rapidly, a mutual understanding being plainly reached during the seventeen days of cage courtship. Louis brought food to Louise, and they had all thins in common except liberty.

April 12, in the early morning, the cage was taken out-of-doors and Louise was set free. She was quick to embrace her change, and flew into the neighboring shrubbery. For six days she reveled in her new-found

CARDINAL AND HOUSE SPARROWS

April 16, he lured her into the house, and after that they came often for food, flying fearlessly in at the window, and delighting their friends with their songs and charming ways. Louis invariably gave the choicest morsels to his mate, and the course of true love seemed to cross the adage; but alas! Death was already adjusting an arrow for that shining mark.

April 25, Louise stayed in the house all day, going out at nightfall. Again the following day she remained indoors, Louis feeding her; bur her excellent appetite disarmed suspicion, and it was thought that she had taken refuge from the cold and rain, especially as she spent the night within. The third morning April 27, she died. An examination of her body revealed three dreadful wounds.

Louis came twittering to the window, but was not let in until a day or two after, when a new bird, “Louisa,” had been put in the cage. 0100 86 When he saw the familiar form, he evidently thought his lost love restored, for he burst into glorious song; but, soon discovering his mistake, he stopped short in his hallelujahs, and walked around the cage inspecting the occupant.

Louisa's admiration for the Cardinal was marked; but for some

CARDINAL

The second wooing progressed rapidly, and May 7, when Louisa was set free, the pair flew away together with unrestrained delight. After three days of liberty, Louisa flew back to the house with her mate, and thenceforth was a frequent visitor.

May 21, Louisa was seen carrying straws, and on June 6 her nest was discovered low down in a dense evergreen thorn ( Cratægus pyracantha ). Four speckled eggs lay in the nest. These were hatched June 9, the parent birds, meantime and afterward, going regularly to market and keeping up social relations with their friends.

In nine days after their exit from the shell, the little Cardinals left the nest and faced life's sterner realities. A black cat was their worst foe, and more than once during their youth Louis flew to his devoted commissary and made known his anxiety. Each time, on following him to then nest, she found the black prowler, or one of his kind, watching for prey. On June 28, the black cat outwitted the allied forces, Señor Cardinal and his friends, and a little one was slain. The other three grew up and enjoyed all the privileges of their parents, flying in at the window and frequenting the bountiful porch.

July 25, Louisa disappeared from the scene, presumably on a southern trip, leaving the Cardinal sole protector, provider and peacemaker for their lively and development of a young Cardinal as of an English schoolboy, possibly due in both cases to a meat diet.

Over-feeding was but temporary with our birds. On the 8th of August the migratory instinct prevailed over ease, indulgence, friendship, 0101 87 and the Cardinal with his brood left the house where he had been so well entertained, to return no more. No more? Who shall say of any novel that it can have no sequel? Massachusetts may yet become the permanent home of the Kentucky Cardinal, the descendant to the third and fourth generation of Louis and his mate.

With photographs from nature by the author.

The slate-colored Junco or Snowbird breeds very abundantly in the fields of Digby county, Nova Scotia, and its neat nest are often so artistically placed that they are a continual temptation to the naturalist photographer. One nest, in particular, with four eggs, was especially beautiful, seen through the ground glass of the camera, the contrast between the eggs and the waxy green leaves and scarlet fruit of the bunch-berries near it making one long for color photography. This nest was in a field, five feet from a road, and partly protected by a tiny bank of turf.

Five days after the photograph was taken the eggs hatched, and four balls of long, jet-black fuzz appeared. Daily twelve-hour meals of green measuring-worms, provided by the parents, wrought marvels in the appearance of the young birds, and in a surprisingly short time a second suit of streaked black and brown was assumed. In this, perhaps, the facsimile of their ancestors' plumage, they left the 0130 114 nest, and apparently lost individuality among the large flocks of their species.

Another abundant summer bird of this part of Nova Scotia is the Night-hawk, the name being almost a misnomer, as they are visible in numbers, flying all day. Bull all do not depart from their usual custom of sleeping during the day, as is shown in the accompanying photograph, taken about 11 A. M. one August day, 1898.

NIGHT-HAWK ASLEEP

When it awoke what a dream it might relate to its companions of being approached by a horrible one-eyed, three-legged creature, which at a glance made it immortal!

The photograph of the Junco's nest and eggs was made with a 128 opening and a 4-second exposure, while that of the Night-hawk was stopped at 64, with an exposure of two seconds.

MAPLE LAKE, in St. Charles county, Mo., is one of a series of lakes situated between the bluffs and the Mississippi River. The bluffs are four to five miles from the river bank, thus leaving a wide stretch of alluvial land, lowest toward the bluffs. forming an extended, nearly level marsh, mostly too wet and poor for cultivation, and covered with square miles of cordgrass ( Spartina cynosuraides ). In dry summers or on higher levels it reaches only a height of three or four feet, but in wet summers, as for instance in 1898, it attains the stately height of six to eight feet, with such a dense growth of rigid leaves that it is hard work to walk or even drive through. As a commercial article it is worth very little, though it will make good paper. When young it is liked by horses and cattle, and when two feet high it makes pretty good hay, which is sometimes baled and sold as prairie hay.

But while man does not yet know how to make good use of it, birds do, especially some species of the families Hirundinidae and Icteridæ— the Swallow and Blackbird families—who find in the spartina the material for a good and safe dormitory. Hundreds of acres of this grass cover the region about Maple Lake, and as they are within the confines of one of the best managed club grounds, where neither plow nor cattle, neither drainage nor fire are allowed, they serve many kinds of birds for a roosting place at all seasons of the year, but especially in fall migration.

Of Swallows, the most numerous frequenters are the Eaves, the Tree or Whitebreasts, and the Roughwings, and they show their appreciation of this rare place of security and peace by coming early in the season and staying late. When the Eaves have become strangers at their breeding stations for a long time, the marsh is the place to find them in plenty. Here is the place to look for the first Whitebreast of the year as early as the second week of March, and for the last, in the third week of October. For two months, from the middle of August to the middle of October, a cloud of Swallows may be seen every evening, just before dark, hovering over the most remote and inaccessible part of the immense spartina waste, and wherever you are in the marsh in the late afternoon, you cannot fail to notice innumerable Swallows skimming the grassy ocean and the adjacent lakes. If toward sunset you watch them closely, you will find that, though they may linger long on some favorite hunting ground, the general 0132 116 trend is toward one particular region, and if you will wait long enough, you will find that they have all disappeared in that direction and that, when almost dark, belated parties passing by go in a straight line direct for the same unknown destination. Certainly a most interesting sight for the naturalist to see so many of these lovely, lively, likely creatures passing over, about and around you,

TREE OR WHITEBREASTED SWALLOWS Photographed from nature by Edward Van Altena, Alpine, N. J., September, 1898

In spite of their large numbers and generally unconcealed activity, the answer to these questions is not quite easy. Otherwise confiding creatures, Swallows are careful to keep the exact location of their roost as much as possible a secret from the outer world. Neither the persons who live in the neighborhood of the marsh, nor the hunters who desecrate its sanctity, could tell you where 0133 117 the Swallows roost. It requires the persistent efforts and full attention of the naturalist to show you where and how his favorite bird goes to rest and how it sets out and enters upon the duties and pleasures of another day. You have to be after nightfall, alone with the mosquitos and other pests, in the wide, wet and pathless marsh, and again before the faintest glimmer announces the approach of day.

But select a day in the latter part of August or the first half of September, and follow me. We are up early, to be on the grounds before 5 A. M.; the stars are vanishing, one after the other, and the first dawn appears on the eastern horizon; the air is cool and misty, the grass loaded with heavy dew, but we have to plow our way through as best we can. By previous observation we have located the whereabouts of our birds, and we are now fast approaching their sanctum, all alive and alert for the expected disclosures.

Before this, only the hooting of the Barred Owl in the distant woods had broken the silence, but now comes from the depth of his private retreat, the sleepy ‘seewick’ of the Henslow's Sparrow, and at the same time the weak but lively ‘chip chip churr’ of the Shortbilled Marsh Wren. ‘Pink, pink, pink’ exclaims the Bobolink, whom we have startled from his slumber of repose, and, as we advance, up go some Swallows, one by one, to the right, to the left, in front of us, not in masses or bunches, but singly, every few yards one or two flying up, silent, and on wings heavy with dew.

Dawn has been making fast progress the last few minutes, and we can see quite a little distance through the misty air. Now is the time when the Swallows begin of their own accord to leave their perch down in the depths of the spartina and fly with heavy wing through the cool and foggy layer below into the clearer atmoshere above, where the sun's first rays will soon dispel the chilly dampness of their plumage.

While we are still absorbed in the astounding spectacle, daylight is stealing quietly into the novel scene, and discloses the presence of greater and greater numbers of Swallows as far as the eye can reach. Many have gained enormous heights, and are soaring majestically in the sun-kissed zenith. Not so voiceless as the Swallows do the Bobolinks leave the roost. Their pink is continually in the air, and numerous parties are seen passing over, drifting into all directions of the compass. Some alight again, all in their yellow traveling suits, with the exception of one who has a little song for us and wears a somewhat mottled garb with whitish rump. Long-stretched flocks of Redwings pass in one direction, troops of Frackles in another; but, on the whole they do not 0134 118 present anything like the grand spectacle they will later in the year, when migration sends millions of them to this marsh.

The sun is up now, and a little wind is stirring and dispels the clammy dampness of the air. Shortbills sing on all sides, and a few Marylands and Henslows are also heard to sing. Great Blue Herons are on the move, and the Marsh Hawk is at work. A Bittern wings its way across the marsh, attended by a committee of inquisitive young Eaves. There is a peculiar movement now among the Swallows. They seem to concentrate their forces. Let us follow them, and be treated to an unexpected sight.

Fifty thousand Eave Swallows are seated on the protruding tops of sunflowers, which grow here among the spartina in restricted areas, covering a few acres in the middle of the marsh! They sit, several on one plant, as close together as the branches and their weight allow. We draw nearer. until we are within twenty yards of the assembly. The birds must see us, but do not mind, and we have excellent opportunity to watch them. Their numbers are still swelling. The long, narrow, ridge-like stretch of sunflowers is filling up more and more. From the north comes a steady flow of Eaves, all bound for the convention.

It is now 6 A. M.; the influx of arrivals from the north has ceased, and all seem ready for the opening of the session; but they do not look as if they were going to transact important business. Some fly up from time to time, draw a few circles and sit down again. Most of them look tired, as if they had already performed a most fatiguing task. The majority are young fellows, all Eaves, in pale attire, some so small as if not fully grown; but there are also many adults in high dress among them. All are enjoying their rest, some are preening their feathers, others half close their eyes and puff up their plumage, as if going to sleep. There are still some high up in the ether enjoying their enviable wing power; others are hunting low over the marsh, in company with Whitebreasts.

Although the two species hunt, fly and roost together, they do not hold their meetings together. The Whitebreasts' assemblages are held over water. They betake themselves to a pond or lake, and find a perch on the pods, stalks and projecting leaves of the lotus ( Nelumbo lutea ), with which some of these shallow waters of the marsh are literally covered. There is a small pond only a quarter of a mile from the sunflower patch, and this is now just full of Whitebreasts. Now and then a little cloud of them rises from the pond, and after a few evolutions settles down again. There are only a few hundred; the height of their autumnal wandering is several weeks behind that of the Eaves. These are most numerous in late 0135 119 August and early September; but, as their number decreases, that of the Whitebreasts increases, reaching the height at the time the Eaves depart.

In summer the roost belongs almost entirely to the Eaves, who flock here from the surrounding country. So do the Roughwings, a few hundred only, and some Barn Swallows and Whitebreasts, which two species are not numerous breeders in this region.

As soon as migration begins, about the middle of August, the

TREE OR WHITEBREASTED SWALLOWS Immature birds on the ground gathering nesting material, which they drop after carrying a short distance, thus apparently giving a premature exhibition of the nest-building instinct Photographed from nature by Frank M. Chapman, Leonia, N. J., August, 1897

Most of the Eaves that have been gathering on the sunflowers before 6 A. M. are still there at 8 A. M., and the Whitebreasts are also on the lotus yet; but an hour later, when the sun has heated the marsh and started the winged insects on their aërial mission, the time for activity has arrived, and the meetings are adjourned, the birds dispersed. We, too, will adjourn, with the promise to be back for another meeting in the evening. When migration is well under way, the collecting of the Eaves and Whitebreasts begins early in the evening; in fact, large droves are met at all hours of the day, playfully gyrating in the blue heavens above, or describing endless curves upon the glittering marsh beneath. The Roughwings are seldom seen in the marsh in daytime. As soon as they leave the roost at early dawn, they hurry away to their accustomed haunts along the water courses in the timber. where they collect on the branches of a dead tree on the bank, if possible over water. There they sit, soon after daybreak, fifty to one hundred together, silent and lost in meditation, patiently awaiting the dissipation of the vapory dimness, the signal for activity. They are greatly attached to these meeting places, and resort to them often in daytime as well as in the evening. Indeed, these gatherings of Roughwings on certain dead trees along our woodland lakes and streams are quite a feature of the landscape from July till October. Often their ranks are considerably swelled by an admixture of other Swallows—oftenest the Bank Swallows, who join them on their entomologizing excursions, and find it congenial to spend some time on the same perch with their gentle cousins.

In fall migration, the different kinds of Swallows like to mix, hunt and rest together, and it is nothing rare to find four or five species sitting side by side. To be sure of a full view of the whole performance, we are in the marsh as early as 5 P. M., and take a stand west of the roost to have a good light, and also to be in a position where we can overlook part of Maple Lake, over which a large number of Swallows take their way. Indeed, we find them already plentiful, and watch their actions. A few dozens are sitting on the plant stalks projecting from the water, mostly Whitebreasts. From the west comes a pretty steady stream of Eaves. When they reach the spot where the Whitebreasts are gathering now, they pause a moment, and, hovering, take a drink, several at once, after which 0137 121 they continue their course. Is it not strange that they seem to think that this is the only place for Eaves to drink, though the lake is half a mile long?

Bobolinks also arrive in the marsh; small parties pass over, and their pink is often in the air. It is now 5.30 p. m. More Eaves come, drink, and move on. We move, too, following them through the high spartina until we see in the distance an oasis of black dots in the yellow sea of grasses. While we are still advancing, a

‘BIRD NOTES’—TREE SWALLOWS Photographed from nature by Frank M. Chapman

The Bobolinks, for whose special benefit the Hawk's visit was this time meant, are still hovering in the air, but new troops arrive, and after some aimless drifting all settle down to roost amongst the grasses.

The sun is down now, and perfect streams of Swallows are flowing from all sides toward the oasis in the center. This is the moment when the Whitebreasts, who for the last hour have been congregating on the lotus of the neighboring lakes, mingle with the passing Eaves and accompany them to the common roost. The Roughwings, too, have left their haunts and are appearing in the marsh.

The light of day is waning fast, and the smoky air gets dim and misty. The assembled Eaves are now seen to rise in clouds from their oasis, mix their forces with the invading army, and the grandest 0138 122 spectacle ensures. At first it looks as if confusion reigned, but soon the hosts of fleet-winged birds no longer whirl aimlessly through space. All mass and muster, and perform strange evolutions with amazing swiftness and precision. Now we see them scattering and spreading over the whole area on which they intend to roost, apparently to make sure that no danger lurks beneath the grasses. Here they come, skimming, almost touching, the spartina, pass by, and speed onward until lost to sight for a few moments, when all at once a great cloud of moving specks is visible in the distant sky. The specks are Swallows, and the cloud has life; it moves, it rolls, it swells, it comes, it breaks and, like a torrent of wing-borne arrows, darts upon us, scattering and spreading out, as it descends for another wild dash low over the spartina.

The same wonderful maneuvers repeat themselves as long as the evening twilight lasts, and, though with each descent the cloud does shrink in size, it does not cease to rise again until black night has fully settled down, and even after dark small droves of bewildered birds rush madly by our side. Being well within the range of the now settled birds, we cannot go away without disturbing some in their repose; although they are dispersed over a large area, every now and then one will be seen to scamper out and vanish in the darkness.

SINCE I printed, in ‘The Auk’ (Vol. vi, p. I), a description of the Bittern's vocal performances, I have witnessed a repetition of them on three occasions; and the story of my successes, such as they are, may be encouraging to the younger readers of Bird-Lore .

The remarkable sounds, sometimes likened to those of an old-fashioned wooden pump, sometimes to those made by a man driving a stake in wet soil (and the likeness is unmistakable, not to say perfect, in both cases), must have attracted attention. we may suppose, ever since the settlement of the country. The dullest person could not hear them, it would seem, without wondering how and by what they were produced. But up to the time of my ‘Auk’ article, there was only one authentic record, so far as I am aware. that the bird had ever been seen in the act of a uttering them. For my own part, having never lived near a meadow adapted to the Bittern's purposes, I had never so much as heard his famous ‘boom,’ though references to it here and there, in the writings of Thoreau especially, had given me a lively desire to do so. It was a strange accident, surely, that the first Bittern I had ever heard should show himself so openly and for so long a time. Beginners' luck, we may call it, and be thankful that such providential encouragements are not so very uncommon. As the Scripture says, “The last shall be first.”

On the 2d of May, 1889, a year after the observations recorded in ‘The Auk’ article, I was lying upon a cliff on the edge of a cat-tail swamp, listening for Rail notes or a Least Bittern's coo, when a Bittern, very much to my surprise, pumped almost at my feet. By good luck a small wooded peninsula jutted into the swamp just at that point (the swamp, I regret to say, has since been converted into a town reservoir), and, keeping in the shelter of rocks and trees, I stole out to its very tip unobserved. Two or three times the notes were repeated, but I could get no sight of the performer. Then, all in a flash, he stood before me as no doubt he had been doing all the while—in full view, just across a narrow space of open water against a patch of cat-tails. He had taken no alarm, and pumped six or eight times while I stood, opera-glass in hand, watching his slightest motion. Then he stalked away into the reeds, pumped twice,—behind the scenes, as it were,—and fell silent.

Two days later I went to the Wayland meadows, where I had 0140 124 seen my bird of the year previous, and there, seated upon the railroad embankment, as before, I watched a Bittern pump at short intervals for more than an hour. Most of the time he was more or less hidden by the low grass, through which he was slowly traveling down the meadow; but once, coming near the remains of a last year's haycock, he went a little out of his way, mounted it, and boomed in full sight. The Bittern is a wader and a recluse, but once in a while, it appears, he has no objection to a clear platform and dry feet.

I felt myself highly favored. Twice within three days I had been admitted to “assist” at mysteries of which Thoreau, who spent his life in the best of Bittern country, had never obtained so much as a glimpse.

Exactly a year afterward (May 4, 1890) I was strolling along a road near home, when from a meadow beside it came the now familiar pumping notes. I made toward the spot, and by the help of a clump of alder bushes approached within a very short distance of the bird, who stood in short grass, quite unconcealed. A migratory visitor only, he must have been, for I am certain that no Bittern ever summered in that place during my years of residence near it. I watched him at his work till I was tired. Then, bethinking myself of a friend and neighbor who knew nothing about birds, but had once expressed to me a curiosity about the ‘Stake-driver,’ I walked to the village, rang his doorbell, and invited him to go back with me to see the show. The showman was still rehearsing, and we stole upon him without difficulty, and saw as much as we wished of his doings. Though it was Sunday morning, and the bird was as serious as any parson, we took the liberty of laughing a little at his absurd contortions.

Since then I have heard the Bittern's music on sundry occasions, but never have found it possible to come within sight of him in the act of making it. Once, I remember, I was sitting upon a roadside fence, reading, when a carriage stopped and an unrecognized feminine voice said: “Do you see that Heron behind you, Mr. Torrey?” The “Heron” was Botaurus lentiginosus , in a bit of low ground close by a house. I shut my book and gave him my attention, which he presently rewarded by catching and swallowing a snake. This was in autumn, when Bitterns. like lesser birds, are liable to turn up in unexpected quarters. The reader may take the incident, if he will, as a warning against the reading of print out of doors. As a general thing, we may safely say, Nature's page is better than a book.

One season a friend and myself became much interested in the question as to the relative ‘carrying power’ of the three notes or 0141 125 syllables of which the Bittern's music is composed. The discussion began by our hearing a single far-away note, repeated at the proper intervals, at a time when we could not well follow it up. Later investigation, to our no small surprise, compelled us to settle down upon the conclusion that the first note was the one last to be lost as we traveled away from the bird. We were surprised, I say, for the second note is the one which bears, or seems to bear, the accent. Plum-pud-d'n , the creature appears to say, with an emphasis fairly to be called violent upon the middle note. Why, then, should not the middle note be heard farthest? What is emphasis, anyhow, if not, as the dictionary says, a “special force of voice.” Could there be something peculiar, we asked ourselves, in the quality of the first syllable, which made it carry beyond the others? We discussed the matter eagerly, trudging to and fro to make certain of the fact itself, and agreed, if I remember rightly, upon a plausible explanation. As I review the case, however, I am so much in doubt as to the correctness of our theory that it seems quite as well not to state it, but to leave the question to any BIRD-LORE reader who may some day have nothing better to do than to investigate it for himself.

What time the rose of dawn is laid across the lips of night, And all the drowsy little stars have fallen asleep in light; 'Tis then a wandering wind awakes, and runs from tree to tree, And borrows words from all the birds to sound the reveille.

This is the carol the Robin throws Over the edge of the valley; Listen how boldly it flows, Sally on sally:

Tirra-lirra, down the river, Laughing water all a-quiver. Day is near, clear, clear. Fish are breaking, Time for waking. Tup, tup, tup! Do you hear? All clear. Wake up!

The phantom flood of dreams has ebbed and vanished with the dark, And like a dove the heart forsakes the prison of the ark; Now forth she fares through friendly woods and diamond-fields of dew, While every voice cries out “Rejoice!” as if the world were new.

This is the ballad the Bluebird sings, Unto his mate replying, Shaking the tune from his wings While he is flying:

Surely, surely, surely, Life is dear Even here. Blue above, You to love, Purely, purely, purely .

There's wild azalea on the hill, and roses down the dell, And just a spray of lilac still abloom beside the well; The columbine adorns the rocks, the laurel buds grow pink, Along the stream white arums gleam, and violets bend to drink

This is the song of the Yellowthroat, Fluttering gaily beside you; Hear how each voluble note Offers to guide you:

Which way, sir? I say, sir, Let me teach you, I beseech you! Are you wishing Jolly fishing? This way, sir! Let me teach you .

Oh come, forget your foes and fears, and leave your cares behind, And wander forth to try your luck, with cheerful, quiet mind; For be your fortune great or small, you'll take what God may give, And all the day your heart will say, “'Tis luck enough to live.”

This is the song the Brown Thrush flings Out of his thicket of roses; Hark how it warbles and rings, Mark how it closes:

Luck, luck, What luck? Good enough far me! I'm alive, you see. Sun shining, no repining; Never borrow idle sorrow; Drop it! Cover it up! Hold your cup! Joy will fill it, Don't spill it! Steady, be ready, Love your luck!

With photographs from nature by the author

AT intervals throughout the winter, but more often after the first of February, flocks of hardy little brown birds maybe seen about Decorah, Ia., wandering from place to place in search of food. They are the Prairie Horned Larks, harbingers of approaching spring. Some weeks later, when the snow has melted, they seek their favorite haunts in the pasture lands, select a slight elevation from the surrounding surface, and proceed to build their nests. They first dig a hole three inches wide and three inches deep int he softened ground, and then line it on the bottom and sides to the depth of an inch with dry grasses, making a warm nest, level with the surface. I accidentally discovered the first one this season on April 9. It was nicely lined with vegetable down in addition to the usual lining of dry grasses, and was finished ready for the eggs. I returned in a week, but, as the mother bird was not at home, had to content myself with a photograph of the three finely spotted eggs which it then contained. Some children who observed my movements may be held responsible for the destruction of the nest, as

NEST AND EGGS OF HORNED LARK

At my arrival on the bright, sunny morning of April 24, the Lark was at home, and I had another opportunity of trying to

HORNED LARK AT NEST

The enemies of the Prairie Horned Lark seem to be very numerous

The nest and four eggs mentioned above were plowed under to facilitate corn planting, while innumerable nests are destroyed earlier in the season, when the farmers ‘break sod.’ The first nests in March and April are often subject to great changes of temperature. Although they may be built in warm, sunny weather, a sudden cold wave often covers them with snow and imbeds them in ice.

While waiting for the Lark to become accustomed to the camera, I had an excellent opportunity of observing its song flight. Lying there on my back, I enjoyed a splendid exhibition of one of this bird's peculiar traits. From a point a hundred yards from where I lay a happy songster suddenly arose, flying upward at an angle of 45 degrees, not continuously, but in short, quick wing strokes, and singing while he sailed. In this way a circle 300 yards in diameter was crossed and recrossed until fully five minutes had passed, when, suddenly closing his wings, he shot downward like a bullet, slowly catching himself on nearing the ground and curving outward to his starting point. Several similar exhibitions were carried on in exactly the same manner, the time not varying by half a minute. Though the song lacks many of the fine qualities of other birds, it clearly expresses the joy and happiness of the singer. With thrills of pleasure we hear it echo over the hills, and bless the little creature, hoping that in the ‘struggle for existence’ he may thrive and wax exceeding strong.

Clark University, Worcester, Mass.

IN the Nature Study course of the Summer School, a little time was devoted to the honey bee, life of the hive, care and management, and especially the work of bees in crosspollination of flowers and fruits. The closing “laboratory exercise in the subject consisted in a honey spread, the honey being removed from-the glass hive in the window of the laboratory, in the presence of the class, and distributed with hot biscuits and butter, cream and fresh milk. The spread was pronounced the most enjoyable “laboratory work” ever done by members of the class, but to crown the event in the most exquisite way possible, a Hummingbird flew into an open window, and darting, unafraid, in and out among the noisy groups of fifty or more busy people, it rifled the various flowers with which the laboratory was decorated. In closing the windows for the night it was accidentally imprisoned, and on visiting the room next morning (Sunday), I found it still humming about the flowers. Thinking that it might be a female, with nestlings awaiting,its return, I gently placed an insect net over it with the intention of passing it out of the window. It proved, however, on closer inspection, to be a young male, so I thought it could do no harm to keep it a day or two for aquaintance sake, No sooner was my finger, with a drop of honey on it, brought within reach, than it thrust its bill and long tongue out through the net and licked up the honey with evident delight. Releasing it from the net, I dropped honey into a number of the flowers, sprinkling water over them at the same time, and it immediately began feasting and drinking. As it flew about it taught me its bright little chirp, evidently a note of delight and satisfaction. When I visited the laboratory again at noon, I took in my hand a few heads of red clover and a nasturtium with its horn filled with honey. On giving the chirp a few times, it flew straight to the flowers in my hand, probed each clover tube, drank its fill from the nasturtium, and, perching contentedly on my finger, wiped its bill, preened its feathers, spread out its tail, scratched its head, and for the space of a minute or two looked me over and made himself the most delightful of tiny friends. The next time I entered the room. about two hours later, he flew to the door to meet me, and this time I took him home, the better to care for him during the afternoon and evening. In the course of the afternoon about a dozen friends called. Each one was provided with a nasturtium 0174 156 into which a drop of honey had been placed, and nearly the whole time the little bird was flying from one to the other, perching on fingers or sipping from the flowers held in the hand or button-hole, to the delight of everybody, none of the company having ever seen a live Hummingbird so close by.

In the evening he went to roost high up on a chandelier, and in trying to catch him with the net to put him in a safe cage for the night, he fell like a dead bird to the carpet. I held him warm in my hand, thinking that he was about to breathe his last, but anxious to save the precious little life if possible, I very gently opened the bill and inserted a pellet of crushed spiders' eggs as large as a good-sized sweet pea, following it with a drop of water. He had been feigning, probably, as they are known to do; at any rate, in a minute he was as bright and lively as ever. His room for the

NEST AND EGGS OF HUMMINGBIRD SEEN FROM ABOVE Situated in an apple tree 8 feet from the ground Photographed from nature by E. G. Tabor, Meridian, N. Y., June 16, 1897

DO birds reverse the usual order of things, and from a serious and stolid youth develop mature playfulness? I have been led to ask myself this question by observing the extraordinary playfulness exhibited by a pet Skylark in extreme old age. Upon hearing the owner of the bird declare, “Dickie has reached his dotage, and, is now in a state of second childhood,” it occurred to me that birds have no season of youthful frivolity such as Mother Nature accords to her other children. We are accustomed to associate the idea of youth with playfulness: we picture to ourselves the lamb frisking in the meadows, the frolicsome kitten playing upon the hearth, and we groan inwardly when we meditate upon the destructive propensities of our pet puppies, but we think of our young leathered friends as lying inert in their nests, gaping wide open their yellow-edged beaks incessantly for food, and apparently interested in nothing else.

A caged Skylark is a deplorable object generally, but the Lark of which I am about to write was a bird ‘with a history,’ and one, whose cage was not a prison but a home. While his native meadow (in Ireland) was being mowed, one of his wings was struck by the mowing-machine and the last joint terribly mutilated. One of the workmen picked up the poor little sufferer and gave him to a little boy whose father was something of a naturalist and a great lover of birds. Examination of the shattered wing revealed the fact that amputation of the last joint would be necessary if the bird's life was to be preserved. The operation was performed, and the little patient was placed in a very large cage carpeted with fresh, green sods. He was well supplied with food and water; the injured wing healed 0176 158 rapidly; he became surprisingly tame, and soon appeared to enjoy life thoroughly. Occasionally, he was permitted to enjoy his freedom in a large room, but after running about awhile, always seemed glad to return to his cage, the door of which was left open, so that he might go home when he pleased.

He was a beautiful singer, and used to stand in the long grasses and fresh clover of his sod, quiver the poor pinions that could never again soar skyward, and burst into the glorious carol with which he had been wont to salute the sunrise, when, high up among the fleecy clouds, he had appeared an almost invisible speck of personified melody to the enchanted listeners below.

As the years sped by, this much-indulged bird craved petting and attention to an abnormal degree, could be coaxed at any hour into singing, and formed the strange habit of trilling a low, sweet carol at ten o'clock every night, which his mistress called his “good night song.” When he had been caged for twelve or thirteen years he become as playful as a kitten, and was particularly fond of going through what his mistress called the “jungle tiger act,” which consisted of crouching down out of sight in the grasses of his sod, and then springing suddenly forward to bite in a gentle way a finger poked between the wires,of his cage. He never wearied of this game so long as he could induce a child or grown person to engage in it with him, and before he died, a year or so later, he developed a degree of playfulness that almost amounted to imbecility.