THE GOSPEL OF NATURE 



along the street, now upon the ground, now upon a 

 bush, nervous and hurried as usual, uttering its 

 sharp chip, and showing the white in its tail. The 

 sight gave me a real home feeling. It did me more 

 good than the medicine I was taking. It instantly 

 made a living link with many past springs. Any- 

 thing that calls up a happy past, how it warms the 

 present! There, too, that same day I saw my first 

 meadowlark of the season in a vacant lot, flashing 

 out the white quills in her tail, and walking over the 

 turf in the old, erect, alert manner. The sight was 

 as good as a letter from home, and better: jt had a 

 flavor of the wild and of my boyhood days on the 

 old farm that no letter could ever have. 



The spring birds always awaken a thrill wherever 

 I am. The first bobolink I hear flying over north- 

 ward and bursting out in song now and then, full of 

 anticipation of those broad meadows where he will 

 soon be with his mate; or the first swallow twitter- 

 ing joyously overhead, borne on a warm southern 

 breeze; or the first high-hole sounding out his long, 

 iterated call from the orchard or field — how all 

 these things send a wave of emotion over me! 



Pleasures of another kind are to find a new bird, and 

 to see an old bird in a new place, as I did recently in 

 the old sugar-bush where I used to help gather and boil 

 sap as a boy. It was the logcock, or pileated wood- 

 pecker, a rare bird anywhere, and one I had never 

 seen before on the old farm. I heard his loud cackle 



'^55 



