136 IN BIRD-LAND. 
he seems to be fond of haunting the cloudy canopy, 
toying with the wind. 
His call, as he tilts overhead, is difficult to repre- 
sent phonetically, both the vowels and consonants 
being provokingly elusive and hard to catch. ‘To 
me he seems usually to say Sfe-ah. Sometimes the S 
appears to be omitted, or is enunciated very slightly, 
while at other times his call seems to have a de- 
cidedly sibilant beginning. On several occasions he 
seemed to pronounce the syllable Scafe. 
I had often watched the marvellous flight of these 
birds, as they passed like living silhouettes across 
the sky; but they had always seemed so shy and 
unapproachable that, prior to the summer of 1891, 
I had despaired of ever finding a night-hawk’s nest. 
However, one evening in June, while stalking about 
in the marsh, I suddenly became aware of a large 
bird fluttering uneasily about me in the gathering 
darkness. Presently it was joined by its mate, and 
then the two birds circled and hovered about, 
often coming into uncomfortable proximity with my 
head, and muttering under their breath, Chuckle / 
chuckle! Several times one of them alighted for a 
few moments on the rail-fence near by, and then 
resumed its circular flight. Even in the darkness I 
recognized that my uncanny companions were night- 
hawks, and felt convinced that there must be a nest 
in the neighborhood, or they would not display so 
much anxiety. It was too late to discover their 
secret that evening, and, besides, I really felt a shght 
chill creeping up my back, with those dark, ghostly 
