THE KETURN OF THE BIRDS. 21 



There cau be no doubt that the presence of man bae 

 exerted a very marked and friendly influence upon 

 them, since they so multiply in his society. The birds 

 of California, it is said, were mostly silent till after its 

 settlement, and I doubt if the Indians heard the wood- 

 thrush us we hear him. Where did the bobolink 

 disport himself before there were meadows in the 

 ^orth and rice fields in the South ? Was he the same 

 lithe, merry -hearted beau then as now? And the 

 Bparrow, the lark, and the goldfinch, birds that seem 

 BO indigenous to the open fields and so averse to the 

 woods, — we cannot conceive of their existence in a 

 /ast wilderness and without man. 



But to return. The song-sparrow, that universal 

 fevorite and firstling of the spring, comes before 

 April, and its simple strain gladdens all hearts. 



May is the month of the swallows and the orioles. 

 There are many other distinguished arrivals, indeed 

 Line tenths of the birds are here by the last week in 

 May, yet the swallows and orioles are the most con- 

 Bpicuous. The bright plumage of the latter seema 

 -•eally like an arrival from the tropics. I see them 

 lash through the blossoming trees, and all the fore- 

 lioon hear their incessant warbling and wooing. The 

 Bwallows dive and chatter about the barn, or squeak 

 and build beneath the eaves the partridge drums in 

 ihe fresh sprouting woods ; the long, tender note of 

 the meadow-lark comes up from the meadow ; and at 

 Bunset, from every marsh and pond come the ten 

 housand voices of the hylas. May is the transition 



