DRAGON'S BLOOD 223 



reach the surface again. When I switched on the light, 

 at first I could see nothing, and I began to be afraid 

 that the "nangel" had escaped through the open 

 window. Finally on the picture-moulding I spied 

 the celestial visitor. It was a screech owl of the 

 red phase, — they may be either red or gray, — and 

 when I came near it snapped its beak fiercely, to the 

 terror of the Sergeant under the clothes. With a 

 quick jump I managed to catch it. At first it puffed 

 up its feathers and pretended to be very fierce, but 

 at last it snuggled into my hand and was with diffi- 

 culty persuaded to fly out again into the cold night. 



Another singer of the night is of course the whip- 

 poor-will. When I lived farther out in the country 

 than I do now, for two successive years I was awak- 

 ened at two o 'clock in the morning by a whip-poor- 

 will passing north and singing in the nearby woods. 

 The third year he broke all records by alighting on my 

 lawn at sunset in late April. There, under a pink dog- 

 wood tree which stood like a statue of spring, he 

 sang for ten minutes. Only once before have I ever 

 heard a whip-poor-will sing in the daylight. Once at 

 high noon in the pine-barrens, one burst out so loud 

 and ringingly that the pine warbler stopped his 

 trilling and the prairie warbler his seven wire-thin 

 notes which run up the scale. It was as uncanny as 

 when the Lone Wolf gave tongue to the midnight 

 hunting chorus for Mowgli, at the edge of the 

 jungle by day. 



Now, when I live nearer civilization, and alas! 

 farther from the birds, I have to travel far to hear 



