FIELD-DAYS IN CALIFORNIA 



snows and the softer mud-spots, toward O'Neill's 

 Point, which could be seen, a mile or so eastward, 

 jutting out over the abyss, as if on purpose for a 

 spectator's convenience. So he walked, stopping 

 every few steps to look and listen, the stupendous 

 chasm on one side and the pine and cedar forest 

 on the other. Mostly, as in duty bound, he gave 

 his thoughts to the Cafion; but if a bird so much 

 as peeped, his eyes were after it. 



It was during this jaunt, indeed, that he made 

 the acquaintance of the mountain chickadee and 

 the gray titmouse, two Westerners well worth 

 any man's knowing. The mountain chickadee, 

 with whose striking portrait he had long been 

 familiar, is a pretty close duplicate of the com- 

 mon black-capped chickadee of the Northeast- 

 ern States, except that the black side of its head 

 is broken by a noticeable white stripe above the 

 eye. If all birds were thus plainly tagged, the 

 lister's work would, perhaps, be almost too easy. 

 At least, it would be much less exciting. 



This mountain chickadee has the familiar dee- 

 dee of the Eastern bird, — though in a recognizably 

 different tone and with a different prefatory note, 

 — a sweet, thin-voiced, two-syllabled whistle, 

 or song, and the characteristic hurried set of 

 sharp, top-of-the-scale, sibilant notes, which, as 

 we may conclude, led the Indians of Maine — so 



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