174 Bird - Lore 



distress and broken wings, I eagerly following, until safe away from her nest 

 the Nighthawk gracefully rose in air and sailed away, to come back and alight 

 on the bar way. I was puzzled at the bird's distress and quick recovery, and 

 would have followed it further, but grandfather led me away, for he was 

 fond of the birds, and had wished to show me what curious birds they were. 



A pair of Nighthawks had nested on that rock for many years, and was 

 fairly common in that section, but I have not known of a pair nesting there- 

 abouts in many years. In the fall we sometimes see large flocks of Nighthawks 

 migrating in a westerly direction, and their numbers give us faith to believe 

 that somewhere they are holding their own. 



At five-thirty in the afternoon of September 6, 1913, while approaching my 

 home station on a train, I noticed a flight of Nighthawks over the upper harbor, 

 and at home, two miles further, their numbers seemed undiminished, and more 

 were coming out of the east. 



The birds were feeding, most of them flying low, and cutting all kinds of 

 figures in the air, as they rose and dropped, zig-zagged and crossed each 

 other in their search for food. 



My companion of the day had left me, to go to his cottage at Fairfield 

 Beach, eleven miles east of my home, and he found that large numbers of the 

 Nighthawks were feeding over the broad meadows, and that certain of the 

 beach population were shooting them. 



He secured three of the dead birds, while more drifted off with the tide, and 

 evidence that resulted in convicting two men of the shooting, but not without 

 some difficulty, as one of them was assistant city clerk in one of our large cities. 



Making a note of this Nighthawk incursion, I find that on the evening of 

 September 6, 1905, there was a similar migration of Nighthawks when their 

 numbers seemed inexhaustible. 



This time, the birds were flying high in open formation, in slow and heavy 

 flight, as though tired, and came out of the east and disappeared into the west. 



It is an interesting coincidence that both of these flights should have 

 occurred on the same day of the month and the same time of the day, and that 

 both were following the shore of Long Island Sound. 



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