98 AN AMERICAN HUNTER 



The green of the valley was a delight to the eye; bird 

 songs sounded on every side, from the fields and from the 

 trees and bushes beside the brooks and irrigation ditches; 

 the air was sweet with the spring-time breath of many 

 budding things. The sarvice bushes were white with 

 bloom, like shadblow on the Hudson ; the blossoms of the 

 Oregon grape made yellow mats on the ground. We saw 

 the chunky Say's ground squirrel, looking like a big chip- 

 munk, with on each side a conspicuous white stripe edged 

 with black. In one place we saw quite a large squirrel, 

 grayish, with red on the lower back. I suppose it was 

 only a pine squirrel, but it looked like one of the gray 

 squirrels of southern Colorado. Mountain mockers and 

 the handsome, bold Arkansaw king birds were numerous. 

 The black-tail sage sparrow was conspicuous in the sage- 

 brush, and high among the cliffs the white-throated swifts 

 were soaring. There were numerous warblers, among 

 which I could only make out the black-throated gray, 

 Audubon's, and McGillivray's. In Glenwood Springs 

 itself the purple finches, house finches, and Bullock's 

 orioles were in full song. Flocks of siskins passed with 

 dipping flight. In one rapid little stream we saw a water 

 ousel. Humming-birds I suppose the broad-tailed 

 were common, and as they flew they made, intermittently 

 and almost rhythmically, a curious metallic sound; seem- 

 ingly it was done with their wings. 



But the thing that interested me most in the way of 

 bird life was something I saw in Denver. To my delight 

 I found that the huge hotel at which we took dinner was 

 monopolized by the pretty, musical house finches, to the 



