JUNCO. 139 
fore you discover them. They are no longer in 
flocks, but in pairs, and I consider myself fortu- 
nate if I get a timid look from one from among 
the dead branches of a fallen tree top. 
Early last May I was delighted to see a pair 
on the edge of the raspberry patch, but though 
they inspected the recesses of a pile of brush, 
seemed greatly interested in the nooks and cran- 
nies of an upturned root, and reviewed the attrac- 
tions of a pretty young hemlock that stood in a 
moss-grown swamp on the border of the patch, I 
suspect it was only a feint; and when they came 
to the grave business of house choosing they fol- 
lowed family traditions and built under a stump, 
in a hole beneath the root of a tree, under an 
overhanging bank, or somewhere else on the 
ground, with a natural roof to keep off the rain. 
At all events, they left the raspberry patch, 
and with the exception of one or two that I heard 
giving their high-keyed woodsy trill in June, that 
was the last time I saw any of the family there 
until fall. Then they came out in time to meet 
their cousins the white-throats, and stayed till 
after the first snows. 
Like the sparrows, waxwings, blackbirds, swal- 
lows, blue jays, swifts, and others, the juncos live 
in flocks when not nesting. One day in Septem- 
ber I found a number of them gathered around 
an old barn, some sitting quietly on the boards 
and sticks that lay on the ground, and others, as 
