Where Town and Country Meet 



Strange as it may seem to those of us 

 who have learned to think of it as a 

 domesticated, house-loving bird, the phoebe 

 is also a familiar inhabitant of the deep 

 pine woods. The phoebe that builds in 

 outhouses and under bridges is a corrupted 

 member of the family, who, like the chim 

 ney-swift, has been enticed from the ways 

 of its kind by the seductions of civilization. 

 The original phoebe is a dweller in the 

 deepest woods, and there you may still hear 

 his sweet, plaintive song amid the sound oi 

 falling water and the soughing of pines. 

 There is no difference in the physical char 

 acteristics of the two birds. The only dif 

 ference is a change of habitat on the part of 

 the semi-domesticated bird. 



That ringing, bell-like song, which al 

 ways seems to come from a distance, no 

 matter how near the singer may be, is the 

 song of the veery. How appropriate to 

 the "dim religious light" in these solemn 

 aisles of God's woodland temple! Nearer 

 at hand, a Maryland yellow-throat is cry 

 ing, "Trickery, trickery, trickery!" perhaps 

 over some cuckoo's sly deposit of a found- 

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