The Birds’ Calendar 
ness. Its influence is like that of a placid 
stream, whose gentle current serves to rest 
rather than arouse the mind. If the song spar- 
row typifies the morning, the vesper sparrow 
represents the quiet evening that follows a well- 
spent day. And yet—so do all nobler moods 
blend and enhance each other—I have been 
hardly less pleased with the gentle serenade of 
this evening-bird at earliest dawn, through the 
summer, as it perched on a telegraph wire in 
front of my window ; while throughout the day, 
in quiet walks through lane and pasture, it most 
delightfully punctuates the silence. 
While we are in the mood of humble things, 
we cannot fail to revert to that unassuming and 
ever-present summer friend, like a neat and 
modest weed that thrives in every path—‘‘ the 
chipper.’’ Without a song, save in its heart, 
from twig and fence the live-long summer, it has 
done its best with its one note—its one talent— 
to bring cheer into the world; and justice de- 
mands that it be judged by its effort rather than | 
by its accomplishment. 
A night and twilight sound that always makes 
one pause and listen is the call of the whippoor- 
will, a bird most rarely seen, yet probably famil- 
iar to every one by name. By day it lingers in 
244 
