THE CHATS SECRET. 239 



above the ground, and within three feet of any 

 one who might pass, but perfectly hidden. 



The performance of the chat was exceedingly 

 droll ; first a whistle, clear as an oriole note, 

 followed by chacks that would deceive a red- 

 wing himself, and then, oddest of all, the laugh 

 of a feeble old man, a weak sort of " yah ! yah ! 

 yah ! " If I had not seen him in the act, I 

 could not have believed the sound came from a 

 bird's throat. He concluded with a low, almost 

 whispered " chur-r-r," a sort of private chuckle 

 over his unique exhibition. After a few min- 

 utes' singing he returned to his foraging on the 

 ground, or over the lowest twigs of the bushes, 

 all the time bubbling over with low joyous notes, 

 his graceful head thrown up, and his beautiful 

 golden throat swelling with the happy song. 

 The listener and looker behind the screen was 

 charmed to absolute quiet, and the bird so ut- 

 terly unsuspicious of observers that he was per- 

 fectly natural and at his ease, hopping quickly 

 from place to place, and apparently snatching 

 his repast between notes. 



The chat's secret of invisibility was thus 

 plainly revealed. It is not in his protective 

 coloring, for though his back is modest of hue, 

 his breast is conspicuously showy ; nor is it in his 

 size, for he is almost as large as an oriole ; it is 

 in his manners. The bird I was watching never 



