BIRDS AND BIRDS. 159 



clear and motionless ; the air was like a great drum. 

 Apparently every sound within the compass of the 

 horizon was distinctly heard. The explosions back 

 in the cement quarries ten miles away smote the 

 hollow and reverberating air like giant fists. Just 

 as the sun first showed his fiery brow above the 

 horizon, a gun was discharged over the river. On 

 the instant, a shrike, perched on the topmost spray of 

 a maple above the house, set up a loud, harsh call or 

 whistle, suggestive of certain notes of the bluejay. 

 The note presently became a crude, broken warble. 

 Even this scalper of the innocents had music in his 

 soul on such a morning. He saluted the sun as a 

 robin might have done. After he had finished he 

 flew away toward the east. 



The shrike is a citizen of the world, being found 

 in both hemispheres. It does not appear that the 

 European species differs essentially from our own. 

 In Germany he is called the nine-killer, from the 

 belief that he kills and sticks upon thorns nine grass- 

 hoppers a day. 



To make my portrait of the shrike more complete 

 I will add another trait of him described by an acute 

 observer who writes me from western New York. 

 He saw the bird on a bright mid-winter morning 

 when the thermometer stood at zero, and by cautious 

 approaches succeeded in getting under the apple-tree 

 upon which he was perched. The shrike was utter- 

 ing a loud, clear note like clu-eet, clu-eet, clu-eet, and 

 on finding he had a listener who was attentive and 



