152 INDIGO BUNTING. 
Some birds, such as the Red-eyed Vireo, can sing just 
as well while hunting food as at any other time ; in fact, 
I do not remember ever seeing a Red-eye pause long 
in its search for insects—song and search go on together. 
But with the Chewink singing is a serious matter, not to 
be associated with the material question of food ; so, when 
singing, he abandons the dead leaves he has been tossing 
about so vigorously, and, mounting a perch, becomes an 
inspired if not gifted musician. Sweet bird, sing, a friend 
writes it, the “sing” being higher, sustained, and vibrant. 
To this there is often a refrain which suggests an an- 
swering, tremulous J’// try. 
Matins or vespers over, the Chewink returns to 
the ground and resumes his occupation of scratching 
among the leaves for breakfast or supper, as the case 
may be. , 
The Chewink’s nest is placed on the ground, often in 
dried grass, beneath a tangle of running wild blackberry. 
The eggs, four or five in number, are white, finely and 
evenly speckled with reddish brown. 
There are three birds who sing not only through the 
heat of midsummer but are undaunted by the warmth of 
sabia teling a midday sun. They are the Wood 
aaa cyanea, Fewee, the Red-eyed Vireo, and the In- 
digo-bird or Bunting. The Pewee and 
Vireo, singing dreamily from the shady depths of a tree, 
carry the air to the hummed accompaniment of insects; 
but the Bunting, mounting to an upper branch, gives 
voice to a tinkling warble, more in keeping with the 
freshness of early morning than the languor of noon. 
July, July, summer-summer’s here; morning, noontide, 
evening, list to me, he sings so rapidly that human tongue 
can scarce enumerate the words fast enough to keep pace 
with him. The Indigo-bird is in song when he comes to 
us from the South early in May, but it is not until other 
