WILD LIFE OF ORCHARD AND FIELD 



many about Hudson Bay ; while not a few (water- 

 birds especially) would lead us to the very shores 

 of Arctic fjords. For them the summer is so short 

 that ice and snow start them south before we have 

 any thought of cold weather. On their way they 

 pick up all the Labrador and Canada birds, re- 

 inforced by their young, so that an even greater 

 army invades our woods amid the splendor of 

 October than made them ring in the exuberance 

 of June. Then our own birds catch the infection, 

 and singly, or in squads, companies, and regiments, 

 join the great march to the savannas of the Gulf 

 States, the table-lands of Central America, and on 

 even to the jungles of the Orinoco. What a won- 

 derful perception is that which teaches them to 

 migrate; tells them just the day to set out, the 

 proper course to take, and keeps them true to it 

 over ocean and prairie, and monotonous forests, 

 and often in the night! That the young, learning 

 the route from the parents, remember it, is a general 

 proposition attested by the fact that they are at the 

 tail of the procession both ways, for, in proceeding 

 northward, the old males go ahead of the females 

 a week or so, and when returning in the fall, the 

 males again take the lead and the young bring 

 up the rear. 



39 



