BIRD-SONGS 
or heard there in my youth, namely, the prairie 
horned lark. Flocks of these birds used to be seen 
in some of the Northern States in the late fall dur- 
ing their southern migrations; but within the last 
twenty years they have become regular summer 
residents in the hilly parts of many sections of New 
York and New England. They are genuine skylarks, 
and lack only the powers of song to make them as 
attractive as their famous cousins of Europe. 
The larks are ground-birds when they perch, and 
sky-birds when they sing; from the turf to the clouds 
— nothing between. Our horned lark mounts up- 
ward on quivering wing in the true lark fashion, and, 
spread out against the sky at an altitude of two or 
three hundred feet, hovers and sings. The watcher 
and listener below holds him in his eye, but the ear 
catches only a faint, broken, half-inarticulate note 
now and then — mere splinters, as it were, of the 
song of the skylark. The song of the latter is con- 
tinuous, and is loud and humming; it is a fountain 
_of jubilant song up there in the sky: but our lark 
sings in snatches; at each repetition of its notes it 
dips forward and downward a few feet, and then 
rises again. One day I kept my eye upon one until 
it had repeated its song one hundred and three 
times; then it closed its wings, and dropped toward 
the earth like a plummet, as does its European con- 
gener. While I was watching the bird, a bobolink 
flew over my head, between me and the lark, and 
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