APRIL 



21 



High in the air white-bellied swallows reveled 

 in the sunlight. The sweet-breathed west wind 

 bore to us the kindred songs of the purple finch 

 and the vesper sparrow, the plaint of the meadow- 

 lark, the drumming of the downy woodpecker, and 

 the cawing of the crow. In a pine grove near by, 

 the pine-creeping warbler and the chipping spar- 

 row contrasted their monotonous repetitions of a 

 single note, the one giving a smooth, well-rounded 

 trill, the other a sharper, more pointed one. 



BOLLES: Land of the Lingering Snow. 



22 



Wilson says that the only note of the rusty 

 grackle is a cluck, though he is told that at Hud- 

 son's Bay at the breeding time they sing with a 

 fine note. Here they utter not only a cluck, but a 

 fine shrill whistle. They cover the top of a tree 

 now, and their concert is of this character. They 

 all seem laboring together to get out a clear strain, 

 as it were wetting their whistles against their 

 arrival at Hudson's Bay. They begin, as it were, 

 by disgorging or spitting it out like so much tow, 

 from a full throat, and conclude with a clear, fine, 

 shrill, ear-piercing whistle. 



THOKEAU: Early Spring in Massachusetts. 



