among the pebbles of city roofs. The high, flat 

 house-tops are so quiet and remote, so far away 

 from the noisy life in the narrow streets below, 

 that the birds make their nests here as if in a 

 world apart. The twelve- and fifteen-story 

 buildings are as so many deserted mountain 

 heads to them. 



None of the birds build on my roof, however. 

 But from early spring they haunt the region so 

 constantly that their families, if they have fam- 

 ilies at all, must be somewhere in the vicinity. 

 Should I see them like this about a field or 

 thicket in the country it would certainly mean 

 a nest. 



The sparrows themselves do not seem more at 

 home here than do these night-hawks. One even- 

 ing, after a sultry July day, a wild wind-storm 

 burst over the city. The sun was low, glaring 

 through a narrow rift between the hill-.crests and 

 the clouds that spread green and heavy across the 

 sky. I could see the lower fringes of the clouds 

 working and writhing in the wind, but not a 

 sound or a breath was in the air about me. 

 Around me over my roof flew the night-hawks. 

 They were crying peevishly and skimming close 



[7] 



