AN IDLER ON MISSIONARY RIDGE. 15 



defined, — as well as from their presence in 

 a group and their silence, I inferred, rightly 

 or wrongly, that they had but recently ar- 

 rived. For aught I yet knew, they might 

 be nothing but wayfarers, — a happy uncer- 

 tainty which made them only the more in- 

 teresting. Of their beauty I have already 

 spoken. It would be impossible to speak of 

 it too highly. 



As I took the car at noon, I caught sight 

 of a wonderfully bright blood-red flower on 

 the bank above the track, and, as I was the 

 only passenger, the conductor kindly waited 

 for me to run up and pluck it. It turned 

 out to be a catchfly, and, like the Kentucky 

 warbler, it became common a little later. 

 " Indian pink," one of my Walden's Eidge 

 friends said it was called ; a pretty name, 

 but to me " battlefield pink " or " carnage 

 pink " would have seemed more appropriate. 



I had found an aviary, I thought, this 

 open grove of Aunt Tilly's, with its treasure 

 of a brook, and at the earliest opportunity I 

 went that way again. Indeed, I went more 

 than once. But the birds were no longer 

 there. What I had seen was mainly a flock 

 of " transients," a migratory " wave." On 



