A MONTH'S MUSIC. 281 



now writing (May, 1884) I was favored with 

 thrush music to a quite unwonted degree. With 

 the exception of the varied thrush (a New-Eng- 

 lander by accident only) and the mocking-bird, 

 there was not one of our Massachusetts repre- 

 sentatives of the family who did not put me in 

 his debt. The robin, the brown thrush, the cat- 

 bird, the wood thrush, the veery, and even the 

 hermit (what a magnificent sextette !) so 

 many I counted upon hearing, as a matter of 

 course ; but when to these were added the Arc- 

 tic thrushes the olive-backed and the gray- 

 cheeked I gladly confessed surprise. I had 

 never heard either species before, south of the 

 White Mountains ; nor, as far as I then knew, 

 had anybody else been more fortunate than 

 myself. Yet the birds themselves were seem- 

 ingly unaware of doing anything new or note- 

 worthy. This was especially the case with the 

 olive-backs ; and after listening to them for three 

 days in succession I began to suspect that they 

 were doing nothing new, that they had sung 

 every spring in the same manner, only, in the 

 midst of the grand May medley, my ears had 

 somehow failed to take account of their contri- 

 bution. Their fourth (and farewell) appear- 

 ance was on the 23d, when they sang both morn- 

 ing and evening. At that time they were in a 

 bit of swamp, among some tall birches, and as 



