OVEN-BIRD. i li5}3: 
up, less like a chewink than like a hen, you have 
probably found your friend. 
His olive-green back makes him inconspicuous 
when he is among the leaves, and the thick brown 
spotting on his white breast serves as a disguise 
when he is on the ground. If you are fortunate 
you will discover his orange-brown crown, enclosed 
by two black stripes that converge toward the 
bill. 
Like the partridge, the crow, the blackbirds, 
and the meadow-lark,the oven-bird is a walker, so 
that you can distinguish him at a glance merely 
by his leisurely dignified gait, —it is such a con- 
trast to the hopping of the chewinks and spar- 
rows. 
The leaf-house from which the oven-bird gets 
his name varies in its roofing, but the first nest I 
ever found may be taken as a type of the com- 
monest style of architecture. It was a bright morn- 
ing in June, and while walking through the edge 
of a grove of young maples a brown shadow started 
up from under my feet and disappeared in the 
woods. On looking down beside a blooming Solo- 
mon’s seal, I saw what at first glance seemed to 
be a bunch of dry leaves, —one of the thousand 
pushed up by mice or crowding spring flowers. 
But the hint given by the fleeting shadow could 
not be ignored, and I stooped down to examine 
the bunch. I felt it over eagerly, — one, two, 
three sides, no opening; the fourth, my fingers 
