138 HOW TO STUDY BIRDS 



Florida jay, so abundant and saucy, and the shore 

 birds, herons, ibis, and many water fowl so interest- 

 ing — save as thoughtless tourists have exterminated 

 them along the well-traveled routes, a crying abom- 

 ination I 



It Is delightful to escape a month or so of the in- 

 tense cold and wander through the orange groves, the 

 pineries, the swamps, or by the tepid ocean, among 

 the birds. Yet last March, after a month In the tem- 

 perature of the eighties, when I returned home and 

 filled my lungs with deep drafts of the delicious keen 

 air which had been kept on Ice for me. It did seem 

 that never in my life had I so appreciated a bluster- 

 ing New England March. 



