A Book on Birds 



season you come across a small feathered 

 specimen who has a trick of swooping 

 across from one tree to another with a 

 quick, snapping sound midway, as he 

 goes, you may be sure it is he. None 

 but flycatchers behave this way, and the 

 Phoebe is the only member of the family who 

 reaches us so soon — the others, including 

 the Kingbird, the Wood Pewee,the Crested, 

 the Acadian and the Least flycatchers, 

 not arriving until many weeks later. 



In a few moments I find at the far end 

 of the woods the very one w^ho is calling. 

 He is dull of color, but lively of disposition; 

 is just a little larger in size than the Song 

 Sparrow, and places his nest (with its 

 snow-white eggs) against some wall sup- 

 porting a bridge or beneath the shelving 

 rocks of an embankment. I knew one 

 nest even under the eaves of a house, 

 at Valley Forge; for the Phoebe is often 

 very companionable indeed. 



In the immediate rural environs of my 

 own town, he and the Crested have for 

 several seasons availed themselves of the 



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