1913 \mi;\. Morning Awakening. 233 



on May '-".'. 1904, both thai bird and the Robin were singing when 



I awoke a1 2.53; on May 28, L909, the Tree Swallow was heard :it 



5 and the Robin oot till 3.30 (unusually late, probably because it 



was a cloudy morning with drizzling rain); and on June 4th of the 



same year the Tree Su allow w as singing a! ii.Oi! and the Etobh) was 



not heard till 3.07. 1 Other observers have noted this habit of early 

 rising on the part of the Tree Swallow. .Mr. Ralph Holl'mann, in 

 'A Guide to the Birds of New England and Eastern New York' 

 stales that "near a breeding-site the male may be heard singing 

 before dawn, either from the box, or as he Hies to and fro in the 

 darkness." The birds I have heard singing thus have been flying. 

 It is really ;i remarkable performance regarded as an exhibition of 

 endurance. As I am not aware that it has keen described in full, 

 I venture to quote from my journal the notes made May 29, 1904, 

 at Wrentham, Mass. The bird, as stated above, was heard sing- 

 ing when I awoke at 2.53. 



He "sang continuously, apparently without interruption, from 

 the time I first heard him till 3.40. The song came and went, as 

 the Swallow flew about over the pond, now nearer, now farther 

 away, now to the right, now to the left, but never stopping, — a 

 constant tsip-prrup, tsip-prrup-prrup, tsip-prrup, tsip-prrup-prrup- 

 prrup, tsip-prrup-prrup, tsip-prrup-prrup-prrup-prrup, varied only 

 by the varying number of bubbling notes following each tsip. The 

 ending of the performance seemed to come gradually. After a 

 period when 1 heard no song from him, — he may have keen singing 

 somewhere out of my hearing, however, — I came upon him, or 

 another of the same speeies, flying about over the land in full song 

 at 3.56. The song was then kept up till 4.05, when I saw the bird 

 perched high on an oak tree, si ill singing, but after that he allowed 



1 Dr. Oharlea W. Townsend, in 'Birds of Essex County, Massachusetts,' gives 

 notes on the olghl singing and morning awakening of the birds <>n the freshwater 

 marshes of the [pswicta River al Wenham, Mass., in which the singing of the Tree 

 swallow is recorded. This bird began on May 22, L904, al 2.58, thirteen minutes 

 after the first Robin song, which was heard al theverj early hour of 2.45, the sun 

 nut rising on thai date till 4.16. Another note, kindly furnished to me i>y Dr. 

 t<>\\ nsend . makes the Tree swallow begin five minutes after I be Robin al [pswlch, 

 Mass., June 3, 1906. On June i. 1906, al Newton Highlands, Mass. Dr. Town- 

 send heard the Kingbird begin Binglng al 3.08, two minutes after ihc Oral Robin. 

 Dr. Townsend. by the way. permits me to s;iy thai he agrees with me as to the 

 preeminence of the Robin over the Bong and Chipping Sparrows. 



