TOM draw's visit TO PINE BROOK. 205 



day changes, and the sun gets out hot, which I fear it 

 wont. Look out, Tom, watch that beggar to your right 

 there; he has done drumming, and is going to 'light;" 

 and with the word, sheer down he darted some ninety yards 

 from the spot where we stood, till he was scarce three feet 

 above the marsh; when he wheeled off, and skimmed the 

 tiat, uttering a sharp harsh clatter, entirely different from 

 any sound I ever heard proceed from a snipe's bill be- 

 fore, though in wild weather in the early spring time I 

 have heard it since, full many a day. The cry resembled 

 more the cackling of a hen, which has just laid an egg, 

 than any other sound I can compare it to; and consisted 

 of a repetition some ten times in succession of the syllable 

 heh, so hard and jarring that it was difficult to believe 

 it the utterance of so small a bird. But if I waj surprised 

 at what I heard, what was I, when I saw the bird alight 

 on the top rail of a high snake fence, and continue there 

 five or ten minutes, when it dropped down into the long 

 marsh grass. Pointing toward the spot where I had 

 marked it, I was advancing stealthily, when Archer said, 

 "You may try if you like, but I can tell you that you 

 won't get near him !" I persevered, however, and fancied 

 1 should get within long shot, but Harry was quite right; 

 for he rose again skeap! skeap! and went off as wild as 

 ever, towering as before, and drumming; but for a short 

 time only, when, tired apparently of the long flight he had 

 already taken, he stooped from his elevation with the same 

 jarring chatter, and alighted — this time to my unmitigated 

 wonder — upon the topmost spray of a large willow tree, 

 which grew by the ditch side!* 



"It's not the least use — not the least — pottering after 

 these birds now," said Harry. "We'll get on to the farther 

 end of the meadows, where the grass is long, and where 

 they may lie something better; and we'll beat back for 

 these birds in the afternoon, if Dan Phoebus will but 

 deign to shine out." 



On we went, therefore, Tom Draw swearing strange 

 oaths at the birds, that acted so darnation cur'ous, and at 



*I am aware that this will be difficultly believed even in the Uni- 

 ted States. But I will not, on that account, fail to record so singu- 

 lar a fact. Not a week before I saw this myself, I was told of the 

 fact by a gentleman since an Alderman, of New York ; and I am now 

 ashamed to say, doubted it. Michael Sanford, of Newark, N. J., was 

 along with me, and can certify to the fact. 



