WAYS OF NATURE 
oftenest at twilight. The song in quality and general 
cast is like that of its congener, the water-accentor, 
which, however, I believe is never delivered on the 
wing. From its habit of singing at twilight, and from 
the swift, darting motions of the bird, I am inclined 
to think that in it we have solved the mystery of 
Thoreau’s “ night-warbler,” that puzzled and eluded 
him for years. Emerson told him he must beware of 
finding and booking it, lest life should have nothing 
more to show him. The older ornithologists must 
have heard this song many times, but they never 
seem to have suspected the identity of the singer. 
Other birds that sing on the wing are the meadow- 
lark, goldfinch, purple finch, indigo-bird, Maryland 
yellow-throat, and woodcock. The flight-song of 
the woodcock I have heard but twice in my life. 
The first time was in the evening twilight about the 
middle of April. The bird was calling in the dusk 
“yeap, yeap,” or “seap, seap,” from the ground, 
—a peculiar reedy call. Then, by and by, it started 
upward on an easy slant, that peculiar whistling 
of its wings alone heard; then, at an altitude of one 
hundred feet or more, it began to float about in 
wide circles and broke out in an ecstatic chipper, 
almost a warble at times, with a peculiar smacking 
musical quality; then, in a minute or so, it dropped 
back to the ground again, not straight down like the 
lark, but more spirally, and continued its call as be- 
fore. In less than five minutes it was up again. The 
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