THE TREASURE-HUNT 125 



notes and dies away in a spray of soprano twitter- 

 ings. Then there were the silver flute-notes of the 

 little pink-beaked field sparrow, which they were to 

 hear later across darkling meadows, and the strange 

 minor strains of the white-throated sparrow. 



Before long, a sudden thirst came upon Sergeant 

 Henny-Penny. Fortunately they were near the 

 bubbling spring that marked the beginning of Fox 

 Valley, and the whole Band halted and drank in the 

 most advanced military manner, to wit, by bending 

 the rims of their felt hats into a cup. This method 

 the Captain assured them was far superior to the more 

 usual system of lying flat on their tummies, and had 

 the approval of all great military leaders from 

 Gideon down. 



Right in the very midst of their drinking, there 

 sounded from the thicket a hurried warble of a 

 mellow timbre, the wood-wind of the sparrow orches- 

 tra, and they caught a fleeting glimpse of the gray 

 and tawny which is worn only by the fox sparrow, 

 the largest of the sparrows and the sweetest and rar- 

 est singer of them all. A moment later a song spar- 

 row sang. When he stopped, the strain was taken 

 up by the fox sparrow in another key. Three times 

 through he sang the twelve-note melody of the song 

 sparrow, and his golden voice made the notes of the 

 other sound pitifully thin and reedy. Then the fox 

 sparrow threw in for good measure a few extempo- 

 raneous whistled strains of his own, and seemed to 

 wait expectantly — but the song sparrow sang no 

 more. 



