178 LAND OF THE LINGERING SNOW. 



the meadow, they fly with rapid wing-beats .round 

 and round over it, making from time to time a 

 series of short notes, similar to those produced 

 by a person blowing in a rapidly intermittent 

 way across the mouth of a small shallow bottle. 

 Whether this noise is vocal or mechanical in 

 character, the bird controls it, and stops it with- 

 out stopping its flight. This evening the bird 

 as a rule seemed satisfied with twenty-five or 

 thirty successive notes in a series. 



My interest in the bittern was revived by 

 hearing him once more at a distance. Nothing 

 broke the level of the grass where his head had 

 been in sight so long. He seemed to have 

 moved quite rapidly over a space of a hundred 

 yards or more, and to be retreating westward 

 toward the woods and the brook. It was now 

 quite dark, save for the stars and a feeble young 

 moon in the western sky. The snipe were still 

 flying as I left the meadow and picked my way 

 carefully back to the turnpike. Their voices 

 and those of frogs and piping hylas alone dis- 

 turbed the restful stillness of the night. I 

 looked up the road and down. It seemed like a 

 great conduit with light gleaming from both ends 

 along its white and level floor. Should I walk 

 to Belmont and wait for a ten o'clock train, or 

 traverse pastures and an unknown swamp in 

 order to reach Arlington Heights and later the 



