Voices of a New England Marsh 45 



free from frost, although for a week or two later they show scarce any trace 

 of green. Indeed at this time they are even more dreary and barren look- 

 ing than in late autumn, for the deep and varied tones of russet which they 

 wore at that season have since bleached to a uniform faded brown, and the 

 once erect, graceful reeds and grasses, broken by the wind and crushed 

 under the weight of the winter's snows, cover the sodden ground and shal- 

 low surface water with melancholy wreckage. Nevertheless the marshes 

 are by no means unattractive at this time. It is good to breathe the soft, 

 moist air laden with those indescribable and pleasingly suggestive odors 

 peculiar to the place and season; and if vegetation is somewhat backward 

 there is no lack of conspicuous animal life and sound. The birds now sing 

 more or less freely throughout the day and at morning and evening with the 

 utmost spirit and abandon. Besides the Blackbirds and Song Sparrows 

 there are numbers of Tree Sparrows up to the middle of the month (when 

 most of them depart for their summer homes at the north) and Swamp 

 Sparrows in abundance after the close of the first week. From this time 

 until midsummer the song of the Swamp Sparrow is one of the most fre- 

 quent and characteristic of the voices of the marsh. It is a rapid, resonant 

 trill suggestive of that of the Chippy but much more spirited and 

 musical. 



As soon as the frost is well out of the meadows the Wilson's Snipe 

 arrive. During the daytime they remain silent and closely hidden among 

 the grass, but just as twilight is falling one may hear the hoarse, rasping 

 flight-call, scaipe, scaipe, scaipe, repeated by several birds rising in quick 

 succession from different parts of the marsh. Some of them alight again 

 after flying a few hundred yards, but if the evening be calm and mild one or 

 two of the males, filled with the ardor of the approaching love season, will 

 be likely to mount high into the air and begin flying in great circles every 

 now and then pitching earthward, sometimes abruptly and almost vertically, 

 again scarce perceptibly, at each descent making a tremulous humming 

 sound not unlike the winnowing of a domestic Pigeon's wings but louder 

 or at least more penetrating for it is audible, under favorable conditions, at 

 a distance of nearly a mile. It has at all times a strangely thrilling effect on 

 the listener and when heard directly overhead and without previous warning 

 of the bird's presence it is positively startling in its weird intensity. It is 

 supposed to be produced by the air rushing through the Snipe's wings dur- 

 ing his swift descent. 



In the springtime Snipe produce another peculiar sound, a low, rolling 

 kuk-kuk-kuk-kuk-kuk, evidently vocal and usually given while the bird is 

 standing on the ground although sometimes accompanying a slow, labored 

 and perfectly direct flight at the end of which he alights on a tree or fence 

 post for a few moments. This, as well as the aerial circling and plunging, 

 may be sometimes witnessed in broad daylight when the weather is stormy, 



