FIRST WEEK] 



November 



287 



may spoil in the deserted nest, or be left in the cold beneath 

 another nest bottom built over it; little cares the cowbird. 



The ospreys or fish hawks seem to circle southward in 

 pairs or trios, but some clear, cold day the sky will be 

 alive with hawks of other kinds. It is a strange fact that 

 these birds which have the power to rise so high that they 

 fairly disappear from our sight 

 choose the trend of terrestrial 

 valleys whenever possible, in di- 

 recting their aerial routes. Even 

 the series of New Jersey hills, 

 flattered by the name of the 

 Orange Mountains, seem to balk 

 many hawks which elect to change 

 their direction and fly to the right 

 or left toward certain gaps or 

 passes. Through these a rap- 

 torial stream pours in such 

 numbers during the period 

 of migration that a person with a foreknowledge of 

 their path in former years may lie in wait and watch 

 scores upon scores of these birds pass close overhead within 

 a few hours, while a short distance to the right or left one 

 may watch all day without seeing a single raptor. The 

 whims of migrating birds are beyond our ken. 



Sometimes, out in the broad fields, one's eyes will be 

 drawn accidentally upward, and a great flight of hawks 

 will be seen a compact flock of intercircling forms, per- 

 haps two or three hundred in all, the whole number grad- 

 ually passing from view in a southerly direction, now and 



RED-TAILED HAWK 



