CHIPPING SPARROW 299 



June 2,1S5S. 3.30 A.M.— When I awake I hear the 

 low universal chirping or twittering of the chip-birds, 

 like the bursting bead on the surface of the uncorked 

 day. First come, first served ! You must taste the first 

 glass of the day's nectar, if you would get all the spirit 

 of it. Its fixed air begins to stir and escape. Also the 

 robin's morning song is heard as in the spring, earlier 

 than the notes of most other birds, thus bringing back 

 the spring ; now rarely heard or noticed in the course 

 of the day. 



April 17, 1860. I hear this forenoon the soothing and 

 simple, though monotonous, notes of the chip-bird, tell- 

 ing us better than our thermometers what degree of 

 summer warmth is reached ; adds its humble but very 

 pleasant contribution to the steadily increasing quire 

 of the spring. It perches on a cherry tree, perchance, 

 near the house, and unseen, by its steady che-che-che- 

 che-che-che, affecting us often without our distinctly 

 hearing it, it blends all the other and previous sounds 

 of the season together. It invites us to walk in the yard 

 and inspect the springing plants. 



[/See also under Vesper Sparrow, p. 286 ; Sparrows, 

 p. 318 ; Yellow Warbler, p. 349.] 



FIELD SPARROW ; RUSH SPARROW ; HUCKLEBERRY-BIRD 



July 16, 1851. The rush sparrow jingles her small 

 change, pure silver, on the counter of the pasture. 



April 27, 1852. Heard the field or rush sparrow 

 this morning (^Fringilla juncorum),^ George Minott's 



1 [Rush sparrow and Fringilla juncoriim are Nuttall's names, which 

 he got from earlier authors. They seem singularly inappropriate for a 



