June 



cular or twilight birds — not altogether inactive 

 during the day (especially when it is cloudy), 

 and sometimes roaming about very late in the 

 evening ; but finding their most congenial pe- 

 riod of activity — which among birds chiefly 

 means foraging for food — during the short inter- 

 val of half-light. 



Occasionally during the day, oftener at dusk, 

 I have seen or heard, as anyone in the country 

 is likely to do during the summer months, that 

 very familiar specimen of the crepuscular birds, 

 but much better known by its sound than other- 

 wise — the ''night-hawk." The only excep- 

 tions that can be taken to the name are that it 

 is not a '' night" bird, as it flies about mostly 

 at dusk, sometimes in midday, nor yet is it a 

 hawk, being called so only from a resemblance 

 when on the wing, and in its general appearance 

 at a distance. This bird and the whippoorwill 

 are allied, and resemble each other as closely as 

 twins, both being just about as large as a rob- 

 in, and '^ indescribably variegated or mottled 

 with several quiet colors." In one the tail is 

 forked, in the other rounded, and the night- 

 hawk has a white patch on the wing, which is 

 lacking in the other. Otherwise they are well- 

 nigh indistinguishable. Probably there is not 



185 



