80 ALONG THE HILLSBOROUGH. 



mock, through which the road passes, there 

 were no birds in it. It was one of those 

 places (I fancy every bird-gazer must have 

 had experience of such) where it is a waste 

 of time to seek them. I could walk down 

 the road for two miles and back again, and 

 then sit in my room at the hotel for fifteen 

 minutes, and see more wood birds, and more 

 kinds of them, in one small live-oak before 

 the window than I had seen in the whole 

 four miles ; and that not once and by acci- 

 dent, but again and again. In affairs of this 

 kind it is useless to contend. The spot looks 

 favorable, you say, and nobody can deny it ; 

 there must be birds there, plenty of them ; 

 your missing them to-day was a matter of 

 chance; you will try again. And you try 

 again and again and yet again. But 

 in the end you have to acknowledge that, 

 for some reason unknown to you, the birds 

 have agreed to give that place the go-by. 



One bird, it is true, I found in this ham- 

 mock, and not elsewhere : a single oven-bird, 

 which, with one Northern water thrush and 

 one Louisiana water thrush, completed my 

 set of Florida Scinri. Besides him I recall 

 one hermit thrush, a few cedar-birds, a 



