18 PEOCEEDINGS OF THE 



to the north of my home. I have long felt that I should like to 

 pay written tribute to this my favorite bird- walk. 



The hillside in front of our old mansion is thickly wooded. 

 The trees are for the most part tall and stately oaks, beeches, 

 chestnuts or tulip poplars. Here, in summer, the Wood 

 Thrush sings his sweetest, and several nests may invariably be 

 found. In the early spring two or three pairs of Crows almost 

 always build among the upper branches. Throughout the long, 

 hot days of summer the Red-eyed Vireo reiterates his simple 

 sentences and leaves his little cup to hang upon some naked 

 limb, a mute reminder of happier days, when the icy winds 

 of winter sweep down the valley. Along this wooded hillside 

 the Carolina Wren makes the valley ring with his rollicking 

 song on crisp winter mornings, or chatters and scolds as he 

 searches for spiders among the logs of an old woodpile. It is 

 a favorite bit of woods for the Flicker ; the Downy Woodpecker 

 is common, the Hairy less so, the Yellow-bellied Sapsucker 

 is a not infrequent visitor in spring or fall, while the Red- 

 head is intermittently common or scarce over periods of several 

 consecutive years, as is his curious custom. In summer the 

 mournful note of the Wood Pewee is always characteristic of 

 the place, and migrating warblers flit in great numbers among 

 the buds and blossoms of spring or the ripening leaves of au- 

 tumn. 



Over the fence at the foot of the hill lies the meadow and 

 through it flows the placid Tacony. When I was a boy this 

 meadow was a marsh with tussocks and rushes and skunk cab- 

 bages. The Red-wings always nested here and so did the Mary- 

 land Yellow-throat. Modern drainage, alas, has converted 

 this delightful swamp into a commonplace, but useful bit of 

 pasture. Therefore the Red-wings and Yellow-throats have 

 moved on. 



Our walk will be up the valiej^ Looking down the stream 

 we see the water broadening into a pond, with a mill and a 

 village clustered about the dam-breast. Going back over my 

 notes of the past thirty years, I find quite a number of M^ater 

 birds recorded for this pond. I well remember the flock of 

 geese that once alighted in the meadow on a foggy day, but were 



