DAYS AMONG THE PLOVER. 155 



backward. Over the rim of the woods where 

 the chestnut and beech were yellowing, and the 

 gum-tree was firing the lingering green, the birds 

 rose and dipped, scattered and massed, and rode 

 down the storm to the plowed fields which were 

 their favorite feeding-ground at this time. 



This plover came with soft trilling whistle rip- 

 pling from his throat, whether swinging high 

 over the hilltop where crimson tints were creep- 

 ing over the maple, or fanning the air with wings 

 tremulous with speed above the fragrant buck- 

 wheat fields, or skimming low along the corn 

 where the pumpkin was yellowing among the 

 rows. 



We made our blinds in some dark cedar-bush, 

 or where the woolly tails of the clematis were 

 whitening over some reddening clump of briers, 

 or the crimson of the sumac was nodding over the 

 bright purple of the aster. Nothing very scien- 

 tific was needed, and a bunch of corn-stalks or 

 tumble-weeds often served us well. Good imita- 

 tions of the plover for decoys could then be 

 bought in New York, and we often helped out 

 the stock with dead birds propped with sticks. 

 Then came the whistle a common one with a 



