Song Birds and Water Fowl 
trees almost deceive the senses, and suggest the 
vista of a subterranean Paradise—one of those 
dainty scenes that make one sure the Lord loved 
beauty when He made the world. 
As this river has become a source of water- 
supply for the city, the property along the 
banks has been confiscated—we might say, in 
the interest not only of health but of art; for 
the acme of scenic effect is in the various aban- 
doned buildings, made of stone, dismantled, 
silent, and moss-grown; here a residence, there 
‘a mill, discernible through the foliage, and in 
some cases almost overhanging the rocky river- 
inhabiting ravine—the nearest approximation 
to time-worn ruins that is ever vouchsafed to us 
in this glorious land of only yesterday. In the 
interest of the picturesque, and of that instinct 
of the human heart that finds the deepest charm 
of landscape in its reminiscent aspect, and in 
the ivy-trailing evidence of vanished life, which 
can create the only utter silence in the soul—in 
both these interests, it is to be hoped that the 
rampant spirit of utility will never be allowed 
to vulgarize these relics into quarries of brick 
and stone. 
Having heard the fame thereof from other 
ornithologists, I visited the spot late in May, 
30 
