142 IN BIRD LAND. 
on the preceding day. They had, as is their wont, 
come by night from some more southern rendezvous, 
Among them was the oven-bird or accentor, an- 
nouncing his presence with his startling song, which 
at first seemed to come from a distance, but 
gradually drew nearer, like a voice walking toward 
me as it grew louder and more accelerated. On 
account of this quaint ventriloquial quality of voice, 
the little vocalist is often very difficult to find, and 
you are sure to look in a dozen places before you 
at last descry him. What a sedate genius he is, 
as he sits atilt on a twig, or walks in his leisurely 
fashion on the leaf-carpeted ground, looking up at 
you at intervals out of his sage, beady eyes. 
I have hinted that the oven-bird was first seen 
and then heard. In this respect the habits of 
different species of birds differ widely. The ac- 
centors, meadow-larks, orioles, bobolinks, Bewick’s 
wrens, summer warblers, white-crowned sparrows, 
and some other species usually begin at once to 
celebrate with pzeans their return to their old haunts ; 
whereas the wood-thrushes, brown thrashers, and 
white-throated sparrows seem to wait several days 
after their arrival before they tune their harps, —a 
diversity of behavior difficult to explain. Scarcely 
less inexplicable is the fact that some species arrive 
in scattered flocks, others in battalions and armies, 
and others still, one by one. My notes made on 
this day contain this statement: “ Yesterday I heard 
a single call of the red-headed woodpecker ; to-day 
the woods are full of these birds.” 
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