THE INVITATION 211 
The thrushes are the birds of real melody, and 
will afford one more delight perhaps than any other 
class. The robin is the most familiar example. 
Their manners, flight, and form are the same in 
each species. See the robin hop along upon the 
ground, strike an attitude, scratch for a worm, fix 
his eye upon something before him or upon the 
beholder, flip his wings suspiciously, fly straight to 
his perch, or sit at sundown on some high branch 
caroling his sweet and honest strain, and you have 
seen what is characteristic of all the thrushes. 
Their carriage is preéminently marked by grace, 
and their songs by melody. 
Beside the robin, which is in no sense a wood- 
bird, we have in New York the wogd thrush, the 
hermit thrush, the veery, or Wilson’s thrush, the 
olive-backed thrush, and, transiently, one or two 
other species not so clearly defined. 
The wood thrush and the hermit stand at the 
head as songsters, no two persons, perhaps, agree- 
ing as to which is the superior. 
Under the general head of finches, Audubon de- 
scribes over sixty different birds, ranging from the 
sparrows to the grosbeaks, and including the bunt- 
ings, the linnets, the snowbirds, the crossbills, and 
the redbirds. 
We have nearly or quite a dozen varieties of the 
sparrow in the Atlantic States, but perhaps no more 
than half that number would be discriminated by 
the unprofessional observer. The song sparrow, 
which every child knows, comes first; at least, his. 
