THE FIELD SPARROW AND THE CHIPPER 31 
rows, very differently feathered —the male and 
the female. 
In a short chapter like this I am not going to 
attempt a miracle. If you read it to the end, 
“never so carefully, you will not be prepared to 
name all the sparrows at sight. As I said be 
fore, they are a hard set. My wish now is to 
speak of two of the smallest and commonest. 
One of these is called sometimes the chipping 
sparrow, sometimes the chipper, and sometimes 
— much less often — the doorstep sparrow. Per- 
sonally, I like the last name best, — perhaps be- 
cause I invented it. Scientific men, who prefer 
for excellent reasons to have their own names 
for things, call him Spizella socialis — that is to 
say, the familiar or social little spiza, or sparrow. 
The idea of littleness, some young readers may 
not know, is contained in the termination ella, 
which is what grammarians call a diminutive. 
Umbrella, for instance, is literally a small wmbra, 
or shade. | 
With most readers of this book the chipping 
sparrow is a bird of spring, summer, and autumn. 
For the winter he retires to our extreme South- 
ern States and to Mexico. If you live in Massa- 
chusetts, you may begin to be on the watch for 
him by the 5th of April. If your home is farther 
south, you should see him somewhat earlier. 
