WOOD DUCKS AND BLOOD ROOT. 127 



sparrow hawk sailed by me. There are known to 

 be four pairs of these beautiful birds breeding 

 within a few miles of Cambridge this spring. 

 If the men hired by the Boston taxidermists to 

 slaughter birds to keep them supplied with at- 

 tractive material for " the trade " do not kill 

 these exquisite little falcons, the species may 

 soon become comparatively common in eastern 

 Massachusetts. It is one of the most useful 

 and friendly to man of our songless birds. 



Not far from Payson Park in Belmont, and to 

 the northwest of Fresh Pond, is what is sometimes 

 called Summer House Hill. I reached this little 

 eminence, which is one hundred and twenty feet 

 above tide water, at about nine o'clock, and gained 

 from it one of those pleasing half far-away, half 

 near-by views which only small hills can give. 

 The near-by was a mingling of orchards alive 

 with birds and carpeted with new grass al- 

 ready several inches long ; the Concord turn- 

 pike and the brickyards and marshes beyond it ; 

 Fresh Pond with its graceful curving shore, 

 drives, groves, and odd old ice-houses ; Mt. 

 Auburn, the sky-roofed Westminster of New 

 England ; Payson Park with its grand old trees 

 and broad lawns ; and Belmont, the picturesque 

 town of terraces and hillside villas. The far-away 

 was Arlington and its wooded heights ; Winches- 

 ter with its church spires ; Medford and the Fells 



