292 THE BOBOLINK. 



beheld him turn brown and spotted as a Sparrow and be- 

 come voiceless ere they reached the end of their long' 

 voyage homeward! Nor does this bird ever resume his 

 bright colors while caged. Exceedingly perplexing, too, 

 was this change of plumage to the first students of Ameri- 

 can ornithology, who saw the males migrate in immense 

 numbers to the north in spring, but saw none return to the 

 south in autumn. 



As soon as the Bobolinks begin to flock for their very 

 leisurely fall migration, their whole manner is entirely 

 changed. Who would imagine those immense flocks of 

 plain birds, flying high, and in the swift undulating manner 

 of the Goldfinch, over the marshes about Niagara River in 

 August, to be the same species which he saw enlivening the 

 meadows the spring before. That plain and subdued note 

 which it repeats quite leisurely — quait. quait^ quait — could give 

 no clue to the voice of the same bird a few weeks earlier. 

 But fire into the flock as they alight among the weeds and 

 grasses after the manner of Snowbirds in winter, and like 

 them, feed on seeds instead of insects, and you will find 

 them to be veritable Bobolinks in excellent condition, and 

 not at all of mean appearance, clad in their finely-marked 

 suits of greenish-yellow and brown. These autumnal mi- 

 grations continue through the day and the night, and pretty 

 much throughout the month of August along Niagara River 

 and along the shores of our Great Lakes in its vicinity. In 

 the day-time even, one often hears the familiar migratory 

 note above given, without being able to see the birds. On 

 looking carefully, however, one can see them flying very 

 high, seeming scarcely more than dark specks against the 

 sky. 



As these birds move southward, they receive different 

 names according to their habits of diet. In Eastern 



