BALTIMORE ORIOLE 255 



May 18, 1852. These days the golden robin is the 

 important bird in the streets, on the ehns. 



May 10, 1853. You hear the clear whistle and see 

 the red or fiery orange of the oriole darting through 

 Hosmer's orchard. But its note is not melodious and 

 rich. It is at most a clear tone, the healthiest of your 

 city beaux and belles. 



May 25, 1855. The golden robin keeps whistling 

 something like Eat it, Potter, eat it f 



June 28, 1857. I hear on all hands these days, from 

 the elms and other trees, the twittering peep of young 

 gold robins, which have recently left their nests, and 

 apparently indicate their locality to their parents by 

 thus incessantly peeping all day long. 



Dec. 22, 1859. As we passed under the elm beyond 

 George Heywood's, I looked up and saw a fiery hang- 

 bird's nest dangling over the road. What a reminis- 

 cence of summer, a fiery hangbird's nest dangling from 

 an elm over the road when perhaps the thermometer 

 is down to —20 ( ?), and the traveller goes beating his 

 arms beneath it ! It is hard to recall the strain of that 

 bird then. 



\_See also under General and Miscellaneous, pp. 426, 

 430.] 



RUSTY BLACKBIRD ; RUSTY GKACKLE ; GRACKLE ' 



April 9, 1855. Wilson says that the only note of the 

 rusty grackle is a chuck, though he is told that at Hud- 

 son's Bay, at the breeding-time, they sing with a fine 



^ [So usually called by Thoreau, who used only the name crow black- 

 bird for the bird now commonly called the bronzed grackle.] 



