212 



THE WOOD THRUSH. 



had been set upon his head, but often comes forward not too close with a 

 pit of inquiry and greeting. 



The Wood Thrush spends considerable time on the ground looking for 

 beetles and worms, but he is ready at a moment's notice to flutter up on a 

 log or low branch, and stand there surveying 

 you, flirting, or twinkling, the wings occa- 

 sionally to indicate his perfect readiness for 

 further retreat, or else ruffling and shaking 

 his feathers as tho to shake off the memory 

 of the mold. A false step now and he may 

 disappear irrevocably down some forest isle : 

 a quiet glance of admiration serves to reas- 

 sure him, and he may resume his feeding. 



There is an air of gentleness and good 

 breeding about the bird, which goes a long 

 way to disarm a wanton enemy, and one stu- 

 diously hostile there could not be. Brighter 

 than the other Thrushes in color, and marked 

 unmistakably with heavy spots upon breast 

 and sides, the Wood Thrush is further dis- 

 tinguished in a gifted family by its wonder- 

 ful voice. The chanting of the Wood Thrush 

 is one of the choice things in bird music. In 

 the freshness of the undried morning: the Takei 



Photo by the Author. 



bird mounts a low limb and takes up a part ONE TYPE OF NEST. 



in the grand anthem of nature, whose com-- THIS NEST APPEARS NEAR THE CENTER CF 

 Hementary voices may be lost to any ear less 



fine than his. The bird listens to the retreating foot-steps of the morning stars, 

 and sings, "Far away far away." Zephyr stirs the unfolding leaves with 

 his boyish alto and our matchless tenor responds, "Come to me Here in glee 

 bide a wee." in cadences of surpassing sweetness. Altho the singer's voice 

 is rich and strong, so that he may be heard at times for half a mile, there are 

 at the same time grace notes and finer passages which only a near-by listener 

 can catch. The notes, I am told by musical critics, are, of all bird notes, the 

 most nearly reducible to ordinary musical notation ; but the peculiar timbre of 

 the bird's voice, the rich vibrant quality of the tones, is of course inimitable. 

 Their utterance at morning and evening is something more than a clexer musi- 

 cal performance ; it is worship. 



