LYRISTS OF A SUBURB. 87 



made by the white-throat, and hence the latter 

 should wear the laurels. 



I cannot forbear adding one simple incident 

 while I am speaking of the white-crowned sparrows. 

 One day in May I was returning from the woods 

 across a clover field, when a covey of eight or ten 

 of these birds ran before me on the ground or 

 scurried along the rail fence. Their immaculate 

 white crowns gleamed like jewels as they caught 

 the bright rays of the sun and flung them shimmer- 

 ing to my eye. A clump of downy headed dande- 

 lion stalks came in the way of the flock of feath- 

 ered pedestrians, and it was amusing to see the 

 hungry birds seize them, bend down the flexile 

 stems, scatter the down like snow-flakes upon the 

 grass, and then hungrily devour the seeds. It was 

 one of the daintiest phases of bird deportment I 

 have ever witnessed — a picture that would have 

 delighted an artist or a poet. 



I wish you could have seen and heard several 

 lark finches (lark sparrows, Mr. Ridgway calls 

 them) that were to be found for a week or two in 

 the spring along the fences of a wheat-field beyond 

 the commons. How curiously variegated their 

 heads are with chestnut, black and white, giving 

 them quite a striking and picturesque appearance 1 



