6 JOURNAL OF MAINE ORNITHOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 



May, and concluded that it does not arrive in this section till about 

 that time. The speaker, on one occasion, while rambling beyond 

 the White Mountains, was told that a farmer named Peverly, who 

 formerly lived in the neighborhood, always made it a point to sow 

 his wheat as soon as he heard their song ; hence it may be inferred 

 that they make their appearance there about the time for wheat 

 sowing. Peverly, it was said, used to aver that they told him, in 

 so many words, to sow his wheat, and certainly their notes syllable 

 something like it, pitching the voice on the same key for the two 

 first syllables, and repeating the word Peverly three times a fifth 

 higher. Or one may get a good idea of it by striking a keynote on 

 the piano, say "C," twice as a pointed crotchet, and following with 

 three quavers, three times, repeated, a fifth above. 



On the borders of the romantic Peabody River, on this side of 

 the mountains, he was often stopped to hear its love song, ringing 

 from the opposite woods above the roar of the shelving waters, as 

 distinctly as the sound of a bell is heard above the tumultuous roar 

 of a thronging city. In the early hours of a stilly summer morning, 

 you may alwaj'S hear them from the White Mountain Glen House. 

 They seem to gather on the opposite side of the river to hail the 

 first of the sunbeams that descend into that deep, dewy glen. 



The White-throated Sparrows are quite numerous in our section 

 along through the middle of May. Wherever there are cleared 

 fields, with orchards, separated from the farmhouse, and contiguous 

 groves of forest, you will frequently hear their clear, round notes, 

 and once having fixed them in your mind you can never forget 

 them. But it is difhcult, at such times, to get a view of the song- 

 sters, who encose themselves in some retired nook, and seem 

 .solicitous to avoid observation. They nest on the ground, beneath 

 some overhanging stump, or fallen tree. The nest is made of 

 grasses lined with cow's hair and occasionally feathers. The eggs 

 are four or five. 



The last of the species to which he called attention, the 

 White-crowned Sparrow {Fringil/a lezuvphrys), is decidedly the 

 handsomest of the whole family. It is extremely rare here, and 



