THROUGH LIBRARY WINDOWS 115 



(Wilson's Thrush and deceive the elect; he will 

 make you think he is a robin or some bird new 

 to science and you listen peering into the bushes 

 and out will come his inevitable cat-call and 

 you are disgusted and he chuckles over his de- 

 ception. 



The Hermit Thrush is a rara avis. So few 

 know him, and fewer have heard him and 

 still fewer have ever seen him. He is a shy 

 bird and rightly named. I have seen and heard 

 him at his best and it was finer than any orches- 

 tra. Nothing in sounds is quite comparable to 

 it; the song must be heard to know it. It is a 

 wild, wierd, elusive, witching song. It is like 

 and yet unlike the best bird singing. It was a 

 wonderful succession of clear, soft, liquid notes 

 floating through the very spirit of the forest 

 with a certain pathetic melody that touches the 

 heart like soft musical chords ; but it is so ap- 

 pealing. I have heard him when the musician 

 himself was invisible and as etherial as his 

 magic song. Once in a warm July day I was 

 idly resting just in the edge of the woods on 

 a soft bed of ferns and moss. I was nearly 

 asleep, when suddenly right before me was the 

 little brown Hermit of the Woods on a branch 

 pouring forth his matchless song, unconscious 

 of any listener save his petted mate. His head 



