4 ON RP adi vie 
curiously down into a geranium bed, within the 
leafy seclusion of which he presently disap- 
peared. He was nothing but a cat-bird; if I 
had seen him in the country I should have 
passed him by without a second glance; but 
here, at the base of the Everett statue, he 
looked, somehow, like a bird of another feather. 
Since then, it is true, I have learned that his oc- 
casional presence with us in the season of the 
semi-annual migration is not a matter for aston- 
ishment. At that time, however, I was happily 
more ignorant; and therefore, as I say, my 
pleasure was twofold, — the pleasure, that is, of 
the bird’s society and of the surprise. 
There are plenty of people, I am aware, who 
assert that there are no longer any native birds 
in our city grounds, —or, at the most, only a 
few robins. Formerly things were different, 
they have heard, but now the abominable Eng- 
lish sparrows monopolize every nook and corner. 
These wise persons speak with an air of posi- 
tiveness, and doubtless ought to know whereof 
they affirm. Hath not a Bostonian eyes? And 
doth he not cross the Common every day? But 
it is proverbially hard to prove a negative; and 
some of us, with no thought of being cynical, 
have ceased to put unqualified trust in other 
people’s eyesight, — especially since we have 
found our own to fall a little short of absolute 
