A BIRD-GAZER AT THE CANON 



On the second of the two mornings first men- 

 tioned, he had sauntered to O'Neill's Point, and 

 had remarked, as before, how the white frost 

 covered everything (sign of a warm, pleasant, 

 day in New England), giving an extra touch of 

 pallor even to the pallid sage-brush. He had re- 

 marked, also, how warmly an old Indian squaw 

 was wrapped as she came riding through the 

 woods on horseback. "Good morning," said the 

 bird-gazer, as they met. " Umph," said the 

 squaw. Ah, she does n't understand English, 

 thought the bird-gazer, and he tried her with 

 "Buenos dias." " Umph," she answered again; 

 and the two parted as strangers. He might have 

 had better luck with a chickadee. 



Only the commoner birds had been found, till, 

 on the return, in a break in the forest, of which 

 break the sage-brush, always straitened for room, 

 had taken possession, he suddenly descried a 

 flock of extremely small birds of a sort entirely 

 strange to him : slender gray birds, with long 

 tails, — like gnatcatchers in that respect, — and 

 some possible, poorly seen darker patch on the 

 side of the head. He looked at them, and looked 

 again (their activity was incessant, and the looks 

 were of the briefest), and then, with a chorus of 

 little nothings, they all took wing. And the bird- 

 gazer, of course, followed on. Twice he came 

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