LEAVES FROM AN APRIL JOURNAL. 55 



cold weather of last autumn came on. How busily 

 she hums as she flies low over the ground, describ- 

 ing all sorts of lines and curves and angles ; now 

 di'opping into a dry tussock of grass, now hovering 

 for an instant over a bunch of dead leaves by a 

 stump, and looking with all the many thousand 

 eyes in her precious head for a deserted mouse 

 nest, or a cavity among the surface roots, or a 

 favorable spot where she may dig a cave in which 

 to lay her eggs, that the royal lineage may be 

 preserved ! She appears to be a very careful and 

 particular queen. Can it be that she is embarrassed 

 and impatient under my watching, pretending to 

 be busy and thus trying to lead me astray? Prob- 

 ably this is the fact, for after observing her closely 

 a long time, she finally becomes discouraged, gives 

 an angry voice to her wings as she circles near, 

 then suddenly darts away, a moving speck through 

 the trees, and is instantly lost to sight. 



In this swamp, overgrown with alders, festooned 

 with drooping catkins and spice bushes, tipped 

 with golden buds, I am suddenly halted by the 

 flight of a hermit thrush that had been feeding 

 within ten feet of my path. With the exception 

 of the robins he is the earliest of the thrushes. 

 He is only seen in the vicinity of the Capitol 



