AN ORCHARD BIRD-WAY. 



" A rodless Walton of the brooks, 

 A bloodless sportsman I; 



I hunt for the thoughts that throng the woods, 

 The dreams that haunt the sky." 



Samuel Walter Foss. 

 ' 



An isolated orchard certainly comes among the inhabitants, if no great alarm, 



very near being an inner sanctuary of Fluttering hastily to a convenient tree 



bird life. For some reason or other, the top goes a dainty red-eyed vireo, who 



gnarled old trees and matted June grass seems to me to have more of a grey than 



touch either the practical or artistic olive gleam to his shining back. As he 



sense of bird nature very closely, and ap- alights upon the topmost bough 

 peal strongly to many a bird heart, for ,, A bird , g bright gleam ^ me he 

 therein do congregate all sorts and con- A bird , g glance> fea rless, yet discreet," 

 ditions of feathered life. Probably it is 



an exceptional feeding-ground, for the but to show that he is in no way seriously 

 curled and misshapen leaves testify to alarmed he flings down to us some sweet 

 the abundance of the hairy caterpillar and notes of liquid song. It is Wilson Flagg, 

 leaf-worm supply, which proves such de- I believe, that has dubbed him the 

 lectable tidbit to the bird palate. When Preacher, but to me he seems more cor- 

 I see the birds feasting upon these unsa- rectly termed the Lover, for I can but in- 

 vory looking morsels, I can but wonder terpret his accentuated notes into "Sweet 

 at the unregenerate farmer who so loudly Spirit, Sweet Sweet Spirit," a contin- 

 decries the bird as a fruit-destroyer, when uous cry, as it were, of loving eulogy to 

 a few hours' observation will teach him the devoted little wife who is so carefully 

 that to one cherry stolen there are a hidden in her pocket nest in a distant 

 hundred tree destroyers gobbled up, and thorn tree. But all of this time we under- 

 a thousand weed seeds devoured. It is stand his clever machinations, as he care- 

 Wilson Flagg who so curtly says : fully leads us in an opposite direction by 



"The fact, not yet understood in Amer- his song allurements. He flits from tree 

 ica, that the birds which are the most mis- to tree with a naive turn and flutter, keep- 

 chievous as consumers of fruit are the ing upon us all the time, an eye alert and 

 most useful as destroyers of insects, is keen, until he deems us at a safe distance 

 well known by all the farmers of Europe ; enough to be left to our own clumsy de- 

 and while we destroy the birds to save the vice, when, with a quick turn, he wheels 

 fruit, and sometimes cut down the fruit backward to the starting-point, and we 

 trees to starve the birds, the Europeans hear a triumphant praise call to the be- 

 more wisely plant them for their suste- loved "Sweet Spirit." Near a corner of 

 nance and accommodation." the old orchard where there are great 



Our orchard is surrounded by a fence bunches of Elder and Sumach, we hear 

 of weather-stained chestnut rails, whose vehemently stitching, a busy little Mary- 

 punctured surface has been the scene of land yellow throat, doing up his summer 

 many a worm tragedy resulting in the song work with an energetic "Stitch-a- 

 survival of the fittest. We enter through wiggle, Stitch-a-wiggle, Stitch-a-wiggle, 

 a pair of lichen-covered bars, grey-tinted stitch 'em," the "stitch 'em" brought out 

 and sobered by age. How far less pictur- with such emphatic force that it seems 

 esque is our field and hedgerow when in-' the last satisfactory utterance of a work 

 closed by that inhuman human invention, accomplished. His pert vivacity has been 

 a barbed-wire fence, and trim swing gate, most delightfully illustrated by Ernest 

 To be neat and up to date, is never to be Seton-Thompson, in Frank Chapman's 

 picturesque, and seldom to be artistic. "Bird Life," and I am sure the snap-shot 

 But our quiet entrance into the orchard caught him on his last accentuated "stitch 

 has caused something of a disturbance 'em." Dr. Abbot tells us that these busy 



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