184 SPRING AT THE CAPITAL. 



from throwing tufts of grass, one has to 

 throw stones in good earnest, or lose all his 

 fruit. In June they disappear, following 

 the cherries to the north, where by July, 

 they are nesting in the orchards and cedar 

 groves. 



Among the permanent summer residents 

 here (one might say city residents, as they 

 seem more abundant in town than out), the 

 yellow warbler or summer yellow-bird is con- 

 spicuous. He comes about the middle of 

 April, and seems particularly attached to 

 the silver poplars. In every street, and all 

 day long, one may hear his thin, sharp war- 

 ble. When nesting, the female comes about 

 the yard, pecking at the clothes-line, and 

 gathering up bits of thread to weave into 

 her nest. 



Swallows appear in Washington from the 

 first to the middle of April. They come twit- 

 tering along in the way so familiar to every 

 New England boy. The barn swallow is 

 heard first, followed in a day or two by the 

 squeaking of the cliff-swallow. The chim- 

 ney-swallows, or swifts, are not far behind, 

 and remain here, in large numbers, the whole 

 season. The purple martins appear in April, 

 as they pass north, and again in July and 



