114 Birds of Lakeside and Prairie 



woman's description of the wood thrush's song cannot be 

 improved upon. 



We shaped our course up the stream. The Kankakee 

 woods where they edge the river are the haunts of the pro- 

 thonotary warbler, perhaps the most beautiful member of a 

 notedly beautiful family. The prothonotary owes its long 

 name to the fact that it wears a yellow coat such as the pro- 

 thonotaries, or court clerks, wore once upon a time. We had 

 looked forward to meeting these warblers with a good deal of 

 pleasure, but were disappointed to find that only a few of 

 them had arrived from their southern winter resort. One 

 pair, however, came so close to us when we landed at a pic- 

 turesque point on the river that we had a golden opportunity 

 in a double sense to get an adequate idea of the bird's ways 

 and beauty. The prothonotaries have a habit of constantly 

 flying back and forth over the river. Their yellow bodies are 

 reflected in its smooth surface, and the observer has a double 

 color treat every time the bird crosses. The prothonotary 

 builds in a hole in a tree or in a decayed stump, after the 

 manner of the bluebird, and the nests are only less interesting 

 than the birds themselves. 



The tree swallows of the Kankakee. Valley believe that the 

 customs of their ancestors are good enough for the descend- 

 ants. They build in colonies in hollow trees, like their fore- 

 fathers. The tree swallows that wander away into the haunts 

 of men make their homes in bird-houses or in crevices in 

 buildings. Nearly every group of dead tree trunks along the 

 Kankakee River has its swallow colony. There were thou- 

 sands of the birds flying up and down the river, dropping 

 down now and then to dip in its waters. We passed many 

 of them sitting upon the tips of dead branches or upon the 



