8 Massachusetts Audubon Society 



The gulls are birds of our own shores, summer and winter, following 

 the great steamers to sea or hovering over the tip of T Wharf, watching for 

 what refuse food they may pick from the waves. They have little fear of 

 man, for the Audubon Societies have protected them for so many years that 

 they know they are safe. 



Sparrows, pigeons and gulls are the birds which the city Boy Scout 

 sees most often. He may begin his work for the Merit Badge in Bird Study 

 with them, but though he may not go often or ever, to the country, he need 

 not feel that he has no chance to see other wilder birds. Over in the Basin 

 with the gulls all winter long, are the mergansers or shelldrake. Divers 

 and fishermen are they, plunging swiftly and swimming under water faster 

 than the fish on which they feed. Sometimes the shelldrake fly over the 

 city. Rarely a flock of wild geese goes honking by. What a glimpse of 

 romance of wild life comes with these great free rovers who write V, A, 

 or N in the sky! What a trumpet sound their clarion cries are to us; calling 

 us to go forth to the open spaces and be free. 



Nor need the city boy lack other bird mysteries. Often of a summer 

 nightfall, over the Common, I hear the quaint "peent, peent" cry of the 

 nighthawks, and see them swooping and soaring swiftly in the unfathomable 

 blue above my head. Acrobats of the air, they dive, somersault and climb 

 more swiftly and surely even than an American ace in his airplane. They 

 are hawking for insects on which they feed. These country birds have 

 become city dwellers and their young are hatched on the flat gravelly roofs 

 of the great buildings. 



Spring and summer bring other wild birds to the parks, the Fenway, 

 the Common, and even the Public Garden. One busy man, Horace W. 

 Wright, watching the Public Garden mornings, has seen there one hundred 

 and sixteen different species. City boys and girls may study wild birds 

 though they never go to the country. The Audubon Society will gladly 

 help them in this good work. 



ROBIN NESTS ON MOVING FREIGHT. 



PiTTSFiELD, May 20. — A freight car that came through from the West 

 the other day carried a robin in her nest. Trainmen said the bird did not 

 seem to be disturbed by being whisked over the country on a moving train. 



FAITHFUL ROBIN. 



A peculiarly marked robin has been to our yard five consecutive 

 springs, arriving each year in March or April. Through the center of the 

 tail the feathers are pure white, comprising the greater portion. The outer 

 ones are the usual color. The back and breast are liberally spotted witli 

 white. It adds another evidence of memory in birds shown by their seeking 

 former homes. This one seems to be a bachelor. 



He is never "chummy" with any other robin, nor has he brought to 

 our enclosure any progeny. At times he is absent several weeks but never 

 fails to reappear and he takes a dip in our bath occasionally as late as 

 October. That is the month of his departure. He goes with our blessing, 

 and a hope for his safe return. Mrs. M. R. Stanley. 



NO SUMMER BULLETINS. 



As has been the custom since the Bulletin was first published there 

 will be no further issues of the Bulletin until the October number. 



