The Chorus of the Forest 



alarm cries tliat scared his mate out of focus, so 

 I lost a picture. 



Their habit is to build on the earth beneath the 

 jirotection of a gnarled root or fallen linil), but 

 once I found a nest in a tano'le of bushes ten 

 inches above ground. The female slipped from it, 

 hop])ed a\\ay, and trailed a Ming that appeared to 

 be broken, and scjuealed as if mounded. I never 

 saw a killdeer l)lay " 'possmn" more natiu'ally. 

 Che^inks build of leaves and coarse grass, and line 

 with finer material. The eggs are wliite, touched 

 'with brown. Aside from that tribal call from 

 '\\hich they take their names, they sing a sustained 

 song of se\eral notes, much more promising in the 

 beginning than in the ending, that seems so un- 

 necessarily abrupt as to cause one to wish to enter 

 protest. The song opens with a sweet, clear whis- 

 tle, and then slides off without at all fidfilling the 

 expectation it inspired. But where many musi- 

 cians mount the bushes and sing, accompanied by 

 the endless leaf rustle of their mates, the music 

 forms one of the most pleasing parts of the forest 

 chorus. They mount still higher and sing with 

 more abandon quite late, for birds, in the evening; 

 or else their notes sound particularly well at that 

 time on account of the peculiarity of their vocal- 

 izing neighbors who are just running scales to clear 

 tlieir voices for the night performance. 



You never can say you really belong in the for- 



107 



