ON THE PRAIRIE 59 



he wished and slake his thirst, I took the 

 rifle, strolled up the creek valley a short dis- 

 tance, and turned off out on the prairie. 

 Nothing was in sight in the way of game; 

 but overhead a skylark was singing, soaring 

 up above me so high that I could not make 

 out his form in the gray morning light. 1 

 listened for some time, and the music never 

 ceased for a moment, coming down clear, 

 sweet, and tender from the air above. Soon 

 the strains of another answered from a little 

 distance off, and the two kept soaring and 

 singing as long as I stayed to listen; and 

 when I walked away I could still hear their 

 notes behind me. In some ways the sky- 

 lark is the sweetest singer we have; only 

 certain of the thrushes rival it, but though the 

 songs of the latter have perhaps even more 

 melody, they are far from being as uninter- 

 rupted and well sustained, being rather a 

 succession of broken bursts of music. 



The sun was just appearing when I 

 walked back to the creek bottom. Coming 

 slowly out of a patch of brush-wood, was 



