264 SOLITARY THE THRUSH. 



This, alas ! I could not stay to see. And if 

 one must go, it were better to take leave before 

 getting entangled in the toils of the warblers, 

 to be driven wild by the numberless shades of 

 yellow and olive, to go frantic over stripes and 

 spots, and bars, and to wear out patience and 

 the Manual, trying to discover what particular 

 combination of Latin syllables scientists have 

 bestowed upon this or that flitting atom in feath- 

 ers. Before the student is out of bed, a new 

 warbler-note will distract her; in the twilight 

 some tiny bird will fly over her head with an un- 

 familiar twitter ; each and every one will rouse 

 her to eager desire to see it, to name it. 



AYhy have we such a rage for labeling and 

 cataloguing the beautiful things of Nature? 

 Why can I not delight in a bird or flower, know- 

 ing it by what it is to me, without longing to 

 know what it has been to some other person? 

 What pleasiu-e can it afford to one not making 

 a scientific study of birds to see such names as 

 *'the blue and yellow-throated warbler," "the 

 chestnut-headed golden warbler," "the jellow- 

 bellied, red-poll warbler," attached to the small- 

 est and daintiest beauties of the woods ? 



Musing upon this and other mysteries, I fol- 

 lowed my friend up the familiar paths one day, 

 looking for some young birds whose strange cries 

 we had noted. It was a gray morning, and all 



