122 Birds u)i Lung Island. 



Veerie, and more distinctly brown than the Olive-backed Thrush. 

 No one living- within the summer range of the Wood Thrush 

 need feel that he is deprived of bird music of high order. The 

 Hermit alone is his superior. 



Bobwhite, being- an all the year denizen of this locality, 

 is always in evidence. Although each autumn the flocks are 

 sadly de])leted by the gun of the hunter, a remnant is left and 

 they nest behind the little cottage, where my friends always offer 

 me true hospitality. At daybreak each morning the emphatic 

 notes," bobwhite, bob, bobwhite," punctuate the melodious 

 measures of the bird chorus. The call is as characteristic as 

 that of the Whippoorwill at evening-, and possesses a charm all 

 its own. 



While Quail are found in portions of Massachusetts and 

 other parts of the southern portion of New England, I come 

 here to observe them in preference to any nearer locality, and 

 always with the assurance of tinding them close at hand. At 

 intervals throughout the day they are heard from the near-by 

 fence posts, or low bushes; yet they are rarely seen unless one 

 makes a special trip into the fields and pastures for that purpose ; 

 then one seldom finds them until in rapid flight they retreat to a 

 convenient cover of bushes. The sentiment for the protectioti 

 o*" these beautiful and altogether valuable birds will sometime 

 grow into a successful movement to protect them throughout 

 the year. Then they will become so plentfiul again as to be of 

 substantial help to the farnier in protecting his crops from the 

 rapidly increasing- hosts of noxious insects. 



Bobwhite makes a strong ally to the farmer when he is 

 given a chance for his life. While gratitude should be expressed 

 for the increasing sentiment in favour of the protection of all 

 our Ijirds, Bobwhite should not be left out of this favoured 

 circle; for he is both an interesting and useful bird, and as a 

 gan-ie bird his little body is, at most, but a morsel. 



That dainty little waif of the shore, of which I have spoken 

 before, the Piping Plover, is still here, although I found but a 

 single pair, and they were extremely shy. Long before I came 

 up to them, they took wing; but their plaintive piping notes are 

 unmistakable, and as they fly their white wings and under parts 

 are so characteristic as to render their identftv certain. 1 know 



