272 AN OWL'S HEAD HOLIDAY. 



Immature warblers are a puzzling set. The 

 birds themselves have no difficulty, I suppose ; 

 but seeing young and old together, and noting 

 how unlike they are, I have before now been 

 reminded of Launcelot Gobbo's saying, " It is 

 a wise father that knows his own child." 



While traversing the woods between these 

 two clearings I saw, as I thought, a chimney 

 swift fly out of the top of a tree which bad been 

 broken off at a height of twenty-five or thirty 

 feet. I stopped, and pretty soon the thing was 

 repeated ; but even then I was not quick enough 

 to be certain whether the bird really came from 

 the stump or only out of the forest behind it. 

 Accordingly, after sounding the trunk to make 

 sure it was hollow, I sat down in a clump of 

 raspberry bushes, where I should be sufficiently 

 concealed, and awaited further developments. 

 I waited and waited, while the mosquitoes, 

 seeing how sheltered I was from the breeze, 

 gathered about my head in swarms. A win- 

 ter wren at my elbow struck up to sing, going 

 over and over with his exquisite tune ; and a 

 scarlet tanager, also, not far off, did what he 

 could — which was somewhat less than the 

 wren's — to relieve the tedium of my situation. 

 Finally, when my patience was well-nigh ex- 

 hausted, — for the afternoon was wearing away 

 and I had some distance to walk, — a swift flew 



