66 IN BIRD LAND. 



The towhee buntings dropped anchor on the 

 seventh of March, filling the woods with their fine, 

 explosive trills. It was a pleasant day, a sort of 

 oasis in the midst of the stormy weather, and it did 

 not seem inapt to speculate a little as to the thoughts 

 of these birds on their arrival at their old summer 

 haunts, after an absence of four or five months. 

 Was the old brush-heap, where they had built their 

 nest the previous spring, still there? Had the 

 winter storms spared the twig on the sapling where 

 Cock Bunting had sung erstwhile his sweetest trills 

 to his dusky mate ? " What if the woodman has 

 cleared away our pleasant corner of the woods?" 

 whispers Mrs. Towhee to her lord as they approach 

 the sequestered spot. How their hearts must bound 

 with joy when they find sapling and brush-heap and 

 winding woodway all as they had left them in the 

 autumn ! No wonder they are so tuneful ! Even 

 the snow-storms that moan and howl through the 

 woods a few days later cannot wholly repress their 

 exuberant feelings. 



On the same date a whole colony of young song, 

 sparrows stopped at this station on their journey 

 northward, although you must remember that quite 

 a number of their elders remained here through the 

 winter. What a twittering these year-old sparrows 

 made in the bushes fringing the woods ! I actually 

 laughed aloud at their crude, tuneless, quasi-musical 

 efforts. They were not in good voice, and, besides, 

 had not yet fully learned the tunes that are sung in 

 sparrowdom, and could not control their vocal 



