2l6 NATURE STUDY. 



A Song of Dawn. 



BY CHARLK.S 11. OAKES. 



March ij, 1904 — Note 7. 



While the darkness of night was falling back before the 

 dim glimmering of the dawn, I lay in bed thinking. 



The room was in Cimmerian blackness save for a pen- 

 ciled streak of dull gray between the curtain and frame. 

 The stillness about me was as deep as that of a cavern. 

 Suddenly, like a rifle's report, there entered my ears the 

 song, " Whoit-cheer, whoit-whoit-whoit-whoit-whoit, 

 whoit-cheer ! " It could have been heard a quarter of a 

 mile. "Cheer" was long drawn out, and accented, fol- 

 lowed by a rapid run of " whoits," with the last " whoit- 

 cheer " like the first. 



The loud, sweet, wild notes were as clean-cut as those 

 of an oboe, and were poured out just ten feet from my head, 

 through a thin door. I never heard so thrilling a sound 

 in nature. Often enough I had heard him sing before, 

 but never at a time of such absolute quiet. It was that 

 that gave the strain its strange alto relievo setting. 



At about the same time of the following morning, and 

 under similar conditions, I lay waiting for him with closed 

 eyes, and in a tension of expection. It came cutting 

 straight through the silence without a trace of preliminary 

 warning: "Whoit-cheer, whoit- whoit-whoit-whoit-whoit- 

 whoit- whoit ! ' ' This time he had omitted the final 

 " cheer," and substituted a " whoit " in its stead. 



I arose, musingly smiling from the effect of the wonder- 

 ful whistling. I^ooking from the window, in a little while, 

 I saw him tweaking a kernel from an ear of corn which 

 was tied to a limb. Thus he carelessly broke his night's 

 fast even as he had a few minutes since, that of the world's 

 night-silence. And the multitude dare deem birds beneath 



