148 FLORIDA 



that many white-eyes hereabout practice a decep- 

 tive imitation of the crested flycatcher's loud 

 whistle, while others, or perhaps the same ones, 

 sometimes begin with a broken measure, such as 

 I think I never heard from a Massachusetts white- 

 eye, strongly suggestive of the summer tanager. 

 Call him pert, saucy, a chatter-box, Old Volubil- 

 ity, what you will, the white-eye is indisputably 

 a genius. 



But for to-day, and for me, none of the birds 

 sing quite so feelingly or so well as the wind in 

 the tree-tops. I stop again and again to listen to 

 it, and would stop of tener still but for the brevity 

 of the afternoon and the uncertainty I am in as 

 to the length of the walk before me. 



Hickory nuts, split in halves and lying black- 

 ened in the sand, lead me to look upward. Yes, 

 there are the trees, still with bare boughs. Their 

 tender leafage does well to be late in sprouting, 

 even in this Southern country. There is no tree 

 but knows a thing or two. Every kind has a wis- 

 dom of its own. JExperientia docet is true of 

 them as of us. 



And now I suddenly find myself nearing the 

 railroad, and having consulted my watch con- 

 clude to go back over the sleepers. It will be my 

 shortest course, and will have the further advan- 

 tage of taking me past a swamp, on the edge of 



