My Boyhood and Youth 



This first spring, while some of the birds 

 were still building their nests and very few 

 young ones had yet tried to fly, father hired 

 a Yankee to assist in clearing eight or ten acres 

 of the best ground for a field. We found new 

 wonders every day and often had to call on 

 this Yankee to solve puzzling questions. We 

 asked him one day if there was any bird in 

 America that the kingbird could n't whip. 

 What about the sandhill crane? Could he whip 

 that long-legged, long-billed fellow? 



"A crane never goes near kingbirds' nests or 

 notices so small a bird," he said, "and therefore 

 there could be no fighting between them." So 

 we hastily concluded that our hero could whip 

 every bird in the country except perhaps the 

 sandhill crane. 



We never tired listening to the wonderful 

 whip-poor-will. One came every night about 

 dusk and sat on a log about twenty or thirty 

 feet from our cabin door and began shouting 

 "Whip poor Will! Whip poor Will!" with loud 

 emphatic earnestness. "What's that? What's 

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