THE INVITATION. 261 



Stranger alighted before the house, and with a cigar 

 box in his hand approached me as I sat in the door- 

 way. I was about to say that he would waste hia 

 time in recommending his cigars to me, as I never 

 Bmoked, when he said that, hearing I knew some- 

 thing about birds, he had brought me one which had 

 been picked up a few hours before in a hay-field near 

 Ihe \illage, and which was a stranger to all who had 

 seen it. As he began to undo the box I expected to 

 see some of our own rarer birds, perhaps the rose- 

 breasted grossbeak or Bohemian chatterer. Imagine, 

 then, how I was taken aback, when I beheld instead, 

 a swallow-shaped bird, quite as large as a pigeon, 

 with forked tail, glossy-black above, and snow-white 

 beneath. Its parti-webbed feet, and its long graceful 

 wings, at a glance told that it was a sea-bird ; but as 

 to its name or habitat I must defer my answer till I 

 could get a peep into Audubon, or some large collec- 

 tion. 



The bird had fallen down exhausted in a meadow, 

 and was picked up just as the life was leaving its 

 body. The place must have been one hundred and 

 fifty miles from the sea, as the bird flies. As it was 

 the sooty-tern, which inhabits the Florida Keys, its 

 appearance so far north and so far inland may be 

 considered somewhat remarkable. On removing the 

 Bkin I found it terribly emaciated. It had no doubt 

 starved to death, ruined by too much wing. Another 

 Icarus. Its great power of flight had made it bold 

 4nd venturesome, and had carried it so far out of its 

 «^nge that it starved before it could return. 



