6o ON THE BIRDS' HIGHWAY 



is July, will come some November and 

 April pictures in which he was the central 

 figure, and to me will also be brought the 

 picture of a tall maple in a December 

 snowstorm in Massachusetts with him- 

 self perched in the upper branches sing- 

 ing his sad refrain. 



Before turning to study a quaint and 

 curious master musician and to hear his 

 unfamiliar song, we see a bobolink rise in 

 ecstasy of joy from a bending dock, and 

 as his hilarious, romping, ungovernable 

 notes gushing out of his shaking throat 

 reach our ears we find ourselves in many 

 a meadow lounging in the delicious June 

 sunshine among the waving timothy and 

 drinking in the harmony that seems to 

 bubble out of some spring above us in 

 the ether. 



How many of the sportsmen of eastern 

 United States who consider the woodcock 

 their favorite game bird and who ha'/e 

 bagged many a brace, know of, or have 

 listened to their love song. I think we 

 could count them on our fingers. If we 

 seek out a patch of low damp alder, with 

 open stretches of meadow grass here and 

 there where the woodcock loves to dwell. 



