252 NOTES ON NEW ENGLAND BIRDS 



red-wing and song sparrow are singing, and a flock of 

 tree sparrows is pleasantly warbling. A new era has 

 come. The red-wing's gurgle-ee is heard when smooth 

 waters begin ; they come together. 



March 11, 1859. I see and hear a red-wing. It sings 

 almost steadily on its perch there, sitting all alone, as 

 if to attract companions (and I see two more, also soli- 

 tary, on different tree-tops within a quarter of a mile), 

 calling the river to life and tempting ice to melt and 

 trickle like its own sprayey notes. Another flies over 

 on high, with a tchuck and at length a clear whistle. 

 The birds anticipate the spring; they come to melt the 

 ice with their songs. 



March 15, 1860. Here is a flock of red-wings. I 

 heard one yesterday, and I see a female among these. 1 

 These are easily distinguished from grackles by the 

 richness and clarity of their notes, as if they were a 

 more developed bird. How handsome as they go by in 

 a checker, each with a bright scarlet shoulder ! They 

 are not so very shy, but mute when we come near. I 

 think here are four or five grackles with them, which 

 remain when the rest fly. They cover the apple trees 

 like a black fruit. 



March 17, 1860. How handsome a flock of red-wings, 

 ever changing its oval form as it advances, by the rear 

 birds passing the others! 



April 29, 1860. I listen to a concert of red-wings, 

 — their rich sprayey notes, amid which a few more 



1 [The date is, of course, a very early one for female red-winged 

 blackbirds, which ordinarily do not arrive till some time after the 

 males.] 



