LIV 



AZURE WINGS THE BLUEBIRD 



THE people who came over in the Mayflower were 

 charmed with a beautiful bird that appeared in the 

 woods about Plymouth early the next spring after their 

 arrival. It was such a sweet, happy little songster and 

 was of such a beautiful brilliant blue that they were as 

 delighted with it as they had been with their own home 

 robin. This bird is about the size of the English robin, and 

 has a dull brick-red breast. Immediately the Pilgrims 

 began calling it the blue robin, and until the present day 

 many of the children in New England know it by no other 

 name. 



This is our bluebird, which is found over practically all 

 the Eastern United States. There are, indeed, several 

 species of bluebirds, and the western species are more 

 brilliant in color than the one found in the eastern part 

 of the country, and they have less red or even none on 

 their breast. Nevertheless, all of the species are as much 

 alike as two kinds of horses, and they are all generally 

 known all over the country simply as bluebirds. 



When I was a boy we children took keen delight in be- 

 ing the first to see a bluebird or a robin, and it was always 

 an open question which bird would arrive first. In the 

 story of our robin I noted that they sometimes stayed 



