SONG SPARROW 305 



seen in the surrounding low grounds at this season. The 

 ancestors of this bird had evidently perceived on their 

 flight northward that here was a small piece of arctic 

 region, containing all the conditions they require, — 

 coolness and suitable food, etc., etc., — and so for how 

 long have builded here. For ages they have made their 

 home here with the Arenaria Groenlandica and PoUn- 

 tilla tridentata. They discerned arctic isles sprinkled in 

 our southern sky. I did not see any of them below the 

 rocky and generally bare portion of the mountain. It 

 finds here the same conditions as in the north of Maine 

 and in the fur countries, — Labrador mosses, etc. Now 

 that the season is advanced, migrating birds have gone 

 to the extreme north or gone to the mountain-tops. By 

 its color it harmonized with the gray and brownish-gray 

 rocks. We felt that we were so much nearer to peren- 

 nial spring and winter. 



[/See also under Sparrows, etc., p. 323 ; General and 

 Miscellaneous, pp. 418, 428.] 



SONG SPARROW 



1837-47.^ The song sparrow, whose voice is one of 

 the first heard in the spring, sings occasionally through- 

 out the season, — from a greater depth in the summer, 

 as it were behind the notes of other birds. 



July 16, 1851. The song sparrow, the most familiar 

 and New England bird, is heard in fields and pastures, 

 setting this midsummer day to music, as if it were the 

 music of a mossy rail or fence post ; a little stream of 

 song, cooling, rippling through the noon, — the usually 

 1 [Undated paragraph in Journal transcript covering this period.] 



