116 FAMILIAR FEATURES OF THE ROADSIDE. 



is strongly marked about the head and wings with 

 chestnut-brown and a blackish brown; above and 

 beneath his eye are long lines of ashen-gray, and 

 his breast is also this color. The female is similarly 

 but less darkly colored ; she lays four 

 or five light-blue eggs. The nest is 

 usually built in the bushes beside 

 some brook that passes beneath the 

 road. 



The yellow - winged sparrow has 

 been described in the foregoing 

 chapter on Meadow Singers. 

 The field sparrow (Spizella pu- 

 silla) is another small character 

 with a red-brown head, a bit gray 

 over the eye, brown back, streaked 

 black, edged with gray, and an 

 ocher-colored breast ; the bill is reddish light brown. 

 He has a good loud voice of his own, and I am by 

 no means sure that he ever subsides to the cricket- 

 like chirrup such as Wilson describes. His song is 

 restricted to perhaps three tones, but these are dis- 

 tinctly musical : 



Field Spairow. 



