IN THE HEMLOCKS 



him turn tail to a swallow, and have known the 

 little pewee in question to whip him beautifully. 

 From the great-crested to the little green flycatcher, 

 their ways and general habits are the same. Slow 

 in flying from point to point, they yet have a won- 

 derful quickness, and snap up the fleetest insects 

 with little apparent effort. There is a constant play 

 of quick, nervous movements underneath their 

 outer show of calmness and stolidity. They do 

 not scour the limbs and trees like the warblers, 

 but, perched upon the middle branches, wait, like 

 true hunters, for the game to come along. There 

 is often a very audible snap of the beak as they 

 seize their prey. 



The wood pewee, the prevailing species in this 

 locality, arrests your attention by his sweet, pathetic 

 cry. There is room for it also in the deep woods, 

 as well as for the more prolonged and elevated 

 strains. 



Its relative, the phcebe-bird, builds an exquisite 

 nest of moss on the side of some shelving cliff or 

 overhanging rock. The other day, passing by a 

 ledge near the top of a mountain in a singularly 

 desolate locality, my eye rested upon one of these 

 structures, looking precisely as if it grew there, so 

 in keeping was it with the mossy character of the 

 rock, and I have had a growing affection for the 

 bird ever since. The rock seemed to love the nest 

 and to claim it as its own. I said, what a lesson 



