176 BY-WAYS AND BIRD-NOTES. 



I have an exalted admiration of science, and 

 place sincere trust in the outcome of its inves- 

 tigations ; but I also sympathize most cordially 

 with him who wishes he could have angled for 

 Devonian fishes, or who sighs at the thought 

 of the bird-songs of the earth's morning 

 twilight. 



But to return to our text. The curious sug- 

 gestiveness of these fossil fragments of birds 

 is not common to all the organic remains in 

 the rocks. The cast of a delicate wing-feather 

 in the shale of the hills, is a fertilizer of the 

 mind and a generator of strange visions. 

 How far that little quill has been borne down 

 the current of time ! Where was the nest with 

 its soft lining and its wonder of green or blue 

 or marbled eggs ? Did the fragrant leaves 

 droop over and the May-wind breathe around ? 

 Was there a brook hard by with its painted 

 pebbles and its liquid music ? Why was there 

 no sun-burnt boy — no bare-foot girl — no cabin 

 on the hill ? I know a sportsman or two 

 whom it would delight to shoot over a middle 

 cretaceous marsh or shore-meadow where a 

 good bag of Apatornis and Ichthyornis might 

 be had ! What a picnic it would be if one 

 could prepare an ample luncheon and invite 

 professors Gray, Coulter, Lesquereux, and 

 many others to meet one in a jungle of the 

 great Western Coal Basin before it was sub- 

 merged ! What botanizing there would be ! 

 As for me, I should like to tramp with Dr. 

 Elliott Coues in the haunts of Archceopteryx ! 

 Let him collect skins while I make sketches ; 

 let him dissect fresh subjects while I listen to 

 the voices of the strange wilderness. I should 

 like to see the pollen of earth's first flowers 



