72 Bird - Lore 



we could to attract them to our place : boxes and gourds (with holes 

 too small to admit the English Sparrow) were placed here and .there 



the former on the veranda and on posts, the latter hung up in 



trees ; shrubs, trees, and vines which bear their favorite fruits have 

 been planted freely ; and during the hot and dry season we place 

 numerous pans and dishes in the shelter of the shrubbery, and these 

 are kept filled with water for them to drink and bathe in. The 

 result could scarcely have been more satisfactory, for the birds were 

 quick to discover the preparations we had made for them, and each 

 season they have increased in numbers and become more tame. We 

 have House Wrens, Brown Thrashers, Catbirds, Chipping Sparrows, 

 and Song Sparrows nesting within our grounds,* and each morning 

 and evening dozens of Wood Thrushes, Vireos and other species 

 from the adjacent woods and thickets visit the bathing dishes, several 

 often disputing for the first bath. Here, in full view of the capitol 

 dome, Washington monument, and other prominent buildings of the 

 city, not less than thirty species of song-birds make their summer 

 home in our immediate vicinity ; not all of them are conspicuous 

 songsters, but several of them are of the first rank and most of them 

 are fairly common. Each morning in May and June and part of 

 July we are awakened by a veritable flood of bird-melody, so loud, 

 so rich, so ecstatic, that sleep would be impossible except to those 

 who have no ear for sweet sounds or whose slumber is so deep 

 that nothing short of a thunder-clap or earthquake would break it. 

 This matin chorus is made up of many voices. There are Wood 

 Thrushes (half-a-dozen or more), Brown Thrashers (several), Cat- 

 birds (several), a Robin or two, three or four House W^rens, a 

 Carolina Wren, Cardinal, Chewink, Summer Tanager, Yellow-breasted 

 Chat, Red-eyed, White-eyed, and Yellow-throated Vireos, Maryland 

 Yellow-throat, Goldfinches, Song Sparrow, and Field Sparrow ; also 

 songsters of lesser merit, as Prairie Warbler, Chipping Sparrow and 

 Ovenbird, though these are scarcely to be heard at all amid the din 

 of louder voices. Besides these songsters, several other birds are 

 heard whose notes are conspicuous, as the tender-voiced Wood 

 Pewee, the cooing Dove, and the querulous Great-crested Fly- 

 catcher. In all, more than twenty species of true songsters and 

 fully three times as many individual singers. 



This matin chorus begins with the break of dawn and ends after 



*On the afternoon of June 26, 1S9S, in company with two ornitholoq;ical friends, I made a cen- 

 sus of the birds seen in my yard during about >alf an hour's observation. Exactly twenty species 

 were counted, the list being as follows: Hummingbird, Wood Pewee, Wood Thrush, Brown 

 Thrasher, Catbird, House Wren, Prairie Warbler, Ovenbird, Warbling, Red-eyed, White-eyed, 

 and Yellow-throated Vireos, Summer Tanager, Goldfinch, Chipping Sparrow, Indigo Bird, Cardinal, 

 Chewink, Crow Blackbird, and Flicker. Besides these four others (Crow, Fish Crow, Turkey 

 Buzzard, and Chimney Swift) were seen flying overhead or near by. 



