HERMIT THRUSH. 25 
Mr. John Burroughs in his little book ‘‘Wake-Robin” gives a very beautiful de- 
scription of the song of the Hermit Thrush. He observed this bird especially in the 
Adirondac Mountains. The description shows what an eye and ear he has for every- 
thing beautiful in nature :— 
“Ever since I entered the woods, even while listening to’ the lesser songsters, or 
contemplating the silent forms about me, a strain has reached my ears from out the 
depths of the forest that to me is the finest sound in nature,—the song of the Hermit 
Thrush. I often hear him thus a long way off, sometimes over a quarter of a mile 
away, when only the stronger and more perfect parts of his music reach me; and 
through the chorus of Wrens and Warblers I dete& this sound rising pure and serene, 
as if a spirit from some remote height were slowly chanting a divine accompaniment. 
This song appeals to the sentiment of the beautiful-in me, and suggests a serene religious 
beatitude as no other sound in nature does. It is perhaps more of an evening than a 
morning hymn, though I hear it at all hours of the day. It is very simple, and I can 
hardly tell the secret of its charm. ‘O spheral, spheral!’ he seems to say; ‘O holy, 
holy! Oclear away, clear away! Oclear up, clear up!’ interspersed with the finest trills 
and the most delicate preludes. It is not a proud, gorgeous strain, like the Tanager’s 
or the Grosbeak’s; suggests no passion or emotion,—nothing personal,—hbut seems to 
be the voice of that calm sweet solemnity one attains to in his best moments. It 
realizes a peace and a deep solemn joy that only the finest souls may know. A few 
nights ago I ascended a mountain to see the world by moonlight; and when near the 
summit the Hermit commenced his evening hymn a few rods from me. Listening to 
this strain on the lone mountain, with the full moon just rounded from the horizon, the 
pomp of your cities and the pride of your civilization seemed trivial and cheap.” 
The life sketch of the Hermit would be incomplete, should I forget to cite 
Dr. Elliott Coues’ excellent description on the nesting of this bird. He writes as 
follows: 
“How quietly and with what solicitude for privacy the nesting of the Hermit 
Thrush is accomplished! Such care is taken to conceal its nest in the recesses of tangled 
undergrowth that few are the ornithologists who have found it. If Wilson, Nuttall, or 
Audubon ever saw a nest, no- one of them recognized its owner. The nests and eggs 
which they describe as those of the Hermit, were certainly the Olive-backed Thrush’s, 
the only one which nests at any considerable distance from the ground and lays spotted 
eggs. And unless the Hermit has changed its choice of a summer home since Wilson 
and Audubon thought they had discovered its nest, it never bred in the southerly regions 
where they thought it did. But their mistake was not unnatural, since, singular enough, 
neither of these ornithologists knew the difference between the Olive-backed and the 
Hermit Thrush. . .. he manner in which the nest of the Hermit Thrush is built, its 
situation, and the eggs, are all so similar to the Veery’s that one must detect the shy 
parents themselves before being sure which has been found. The nest is built on the 
ground or near it, generally in some low, secluded spot; no mud is used in its com- 
position, the whole fabric being a rather rude and inartistic matting of withered leaves, 
weed-stalks, bark-strips, and grasses—the coarser and stiffer substances outside, the 
finer fibres within. The cup is small in comparison with the whole size, owing to the 
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