IN THE LANDAFF VALLEY 



THE greatest ornithological novelty of our 

 present visit to Franconia was the prairie 

 horned larks, whose lyrical raptures, falling 

 "from heaven or near it," I have already 

 done my best to describe. The rarest bird 

 (for there is a difference between novelty 

 and rarity) was a Cape May warbler ; the 

 most surprisingly spectacular was a duck. 

 Let me speak first of the warbler. 



Two years ago I found a Cape May set- 

 tled in a certain spot in an extensive tract of 

 valley woods. The manner of the discovery 

 which was purely accidental, the bird's 

 voice being so faint as to be inaudible be- 

 yond the distance of a few rods and the 

 pains I took to keep him under surveillance 

 for the remainder of my stay, so as to make 

 practically sure of his intention to pass the 

 summer here, have been fully recounted in a 

 previous chapter. The experience was one 



