78 OLD PLYMOUTH TRAILS 



bell in the watch tower warn of dawn in Nan- 

 tucket in late April. This bell was one of six 

 cast in a Lisbon, Portugal, foundry, intended for 

 a Portugal convent of much renown. In 1812, 

 Captain Charles Clasby of Nantucket visited this 

 foundry, bought the bell, which had not yet been 

 dedicated, sending it to the island in the whale- 

 ship William and Nancy, Captain Thomas Gary, 

 and in 1815 it was hung in the tower. Soon 

 after the stroke of four the sparrows begin to 

 chatter, but before long one hears through their 

 uproar the clear whistle of meadow larks. 

 These flit familiarly about the lower levels of the 

 town singing from gate-post or shed-roof all day 

 long and on the downs they vie with the song 

 sparrows in breaking the lone silence of the place. 

 Save for these, a crow or two and the shadow of 

 a sailing hawk, the uplands lack bird life in April. 

 He who would see birds in plenty, as well as 

 much other wild life, should go over Maddeket 

 way and sit on the shore of Long Pond. There 

 I found the bushy swales alive with marsh birds. 

 Blackbirds gurgled all about. The reedy shal- 

 lows held many bitterns whose sepulchral "Ca- 

 hugancagunk, cahungancagunk" sounded ventril- 

 oqually from the reeds. Coot, sea duck, loons, 



