CHAPTER III 



THE ROBBERS OF THE FALLS, AND OTHERS 



(Hawhs) 



THIS beautiful May morning, the twelfth, the falls 

 were simply glorious. The recent heavy rain 

 had filled the mountain brook with a rushing 

 torrent which took its fifty-foot leap into the dark rocky 

 gorge with an unusual roar. Thence it thundered 

 down a series of cascades to join the river below, past 

 the dark hemlock forest on both sides which added its 

 dignified whisperings to the tumult of the waters. Here 

 and there among the dark green of the hemlocks showed 

 the pale yellows of the oaks, chestnuts, and birches, 

 which were just beginning to unfold their verdure. 



It was warbler-time, and as I scrambled along half- 

 way up the steep declivity, following up the stream on 

 the left bank, I was watching a little company of 

 warblers, among which were several of the beautiful 

 Blackburnians, ceaselessly active in the upper branches 

 of the hemlocks. Just then I caught sight of something 

 which made me lose the warblers. Not far away from 

 me was an oak, in whose second crotch, forty feet up, 

 was a sizable nest of sticks, from which projected, 

 with an upward slant, a stubby thing which looked 



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