DYER'S HOLLOW. 85 



Cape Cod birds, like Cape Cod men, know 

 how to shift their course with the wind. 

 Where else would one be likely to see prairie 

 warblers, black-throated greens, and black- 

 and-white creepers scrambling in company 

 over the red shingles of a house-roof, and 

 song sparrows singing day after day from a 

 chimney -top ? 



In all my wanderings in Dyer's Hollow, 

 only once did I see anything of that pest of 

 the seashore, the sportsman; then, in the 

 distance, two young fellows, with a highly 

 satisfactory want of success, as well as I 

 could make out, were trying to take the life 

 of a meadow lark. No doubt they found 

 existence a dull affair, and felt the need of 

 something to enliven it. A noble creature 

 is man, "a little lower than the angels! " 

 Two years in succession I have been at the 

 seashore during the autumnal migration of 

 sandpipers and plovers. Two years in suc- 

 cession have I seen men, old and young, 

 murdering sandpipers and plovers at whole- 

 sale for the mere fun of doing it. Had they 

 been "pot hunters," seeking to earn bread 

 by shooting for the market, I should have 

 pitied them, perhaps, certainly I should 



