for a quick lunch of grubs, to call for company 

 or telegraph across the fields on one of the res- 

 onant limbs ; here the flocking blackbirds swoop 

 and settle, making the old tree look as if it had 

 suddenly leaved out in mourning leaves black 

 and crackling ; and here the turkey-buzzards 

 halt heavily in their gruesomely glorious flight. 

 With good field-glasses there is no other van- 

 tage-ground for bird study equal to this. Not in 

 a day's tramp will one see so many birds, and 

 have such chances to observe them, as in a single 

 hour, when the sun is rising or setting, in the 

 neighborhood of some great, gaunt tree that has 

 died of years or lonesorneness, or been smitten 

 by a bolt from the summer clouds. 



The sentinel crows are posted.' 



[174] 



