24 AN IDLER ON MISSIONARY RIDGE. 



My thoughts are recalled by a strong, 

 sharp chip in a voice I do not recognize, 

 a Kentucky warbler's, as presently turns 

 out. He walks about the ground amid the 

 short, thin grass, seemingly in the most pla- 

 cid of moods ; but at every few steps, for 

 some inscrutable reason, he comes out with 

 that quick, peremptory call. And all the 

 while I keep saying to myself, "What a 

 beauty ! " But my forenoon is past. I rise 

 to go, and at the motion he takes flight. 

 Near the spring the goldfinches are still in 

 full chorus, and just beyond them in the path 

 is a mourning dove. 



That was a good season : hymns without 

 words, "a sermon not made with hands," 

 and the world shut out. Three days after- 

 ward, fast as my vacation was running away, 

 I went to the same place again. The olive- 

 backed thrushes were still singing, to my 

 surprise, and the Kentucky warblers were 

 still feeding in the grass. The scarlet tana- 

 ger sang (it is curious how much oftener I 

 mention him than the comparatively unfa- 

 miliar, but here extremely common summer 

 tanager), the cuckoo called, the Acadian 

 flycatcher was building her nest, on a hori- 



