16 IN THE FLAT-WOODS. 



always in the pine lands, and haunting the 

 dense undergrowth, it is heard a hundred 

 times where it is seen once, a point greatly 

 in favor of its effectiveness as a musician. 

 Mr. Brewster speaks of it as singing always 

 from an elevated perch, while the birds that 

 I saw in the act of song, a very limited num- 

 ber, were invariably perched low. One that 

 I watched in New Smyrna (one of a small 

 chorus, the others being invisible) sang for 

 a quarter of an hour from a stake or stump 

 which rose perhaps a foot above the dwarf 

 palmetto. It was the same song that I had 

 heard in St. Augustine ; only the birds here 

 were in a livelier mood, and sang out instead 

 of sotto voce. The long introductory note 

 sounded sometimes as if it were indrawn, and 

 often, if not always, had a considerable burr 

 in it. Once in a while the strain was caught 

 up at the end and sung over again, after the 

 manner of the field sparrow, one of that 

 bird's prettiest tricks. At other times the 

 song was delivered with full voice, and then 

 repeated almost under the singer's breath. 

 This was done beautifully in the Port Orange 

 flat-woods, the bird being almost at my feet. 

 I had seen him a moment before, and saw him 



