In the Heart of the Pines 



limb scolding you and flirting his tail as he 

 scolds. But he does not seem very much 

 alarmed, for it is rarely indeed that any 

 human being disturbs the red squirrel's 

 summer residence. Most of the boys sup- 

 pose them to be deserted crows' nests at 

 least that was the theory in my boyhood 

 days and no one but a boy would care to 

 investigate the odd clump in the pine-top. 

 Here comes a little bird that is a great 

 lover of the pine woods one of our sweet- 

 est and shyest woodland singers. You al- 

 most need a glass to see him, he is so small 

 and so incessantly active ; but once get your 

 eye on him, and you will not forget him, 

 with his trim shape and pretty marking. 

 This is the black-throated green warbler 

 (why can't the ornithologists give him, and 

 some others of his family, a less involved 

 and less complicated name?), and if you will 

 keep perfectly quiet for a few minutes you 

 will probably hear his sweet, thin, and, it 

 must be confessed, rather vague and char- 

 acterless song. The shy, restless, and ever- 

 vanishing little fellow seems like some spirit 

 of the woods wandering through the 

 branches of the dark old pines. 

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