408 NOTES ON NEW ENGLAND BIRDS 



the notes of birds, — song sparrows, red-wings, robins 

 (singing a strain), bluebirds, — and I hear also a lark, 

 - — as if all the earth had burst forth into song. The 

 influence of this April morning has reached them, for 

 they live out-of-doors all the nighty and there is no 

 danger that they will oversleep themselves such a 

 morning. 



April 4, 1852. P. M. — Going across Wheeler's large 

 field beyond Potter's, saw a large flock of small birds 

 go by, I am not sure what kind, the near ones contin- 

 ually overtaking the foremost, so that the whole flock 

 appeared to roll over as it went forward. When they 

 lit on a tree, they appeared at a distance to clothe it 

 like dead leaves. 



April 17, 1852. Gilpin says, " As the wheeling mo- 

 tion of the gull is beautiful, so also is the figured flight 

 of the goose, the duck, and the widgeon ; all of which 

 are highly ornamental to coast-views, bays, and estua- 

 ries." ' A flight of ducks adds to the wildness of our 

 wildest river scenery. Undoubtedly the soaring and 

 sailing of the hen-hawk, the red-shouldered buzzard (?), 

 is the most ornamental, graceful, stately, beautiful to 

 contemplate, of all the birds that ordinarily frequent 

 our skies. The eagle is but a rare and casual visitor. 

 The goose, the osprey, the great heron, though interest- 

 ing, are either transient visitors or rarely seen ; they 

 either move through the air as passengers or too exclu- 

 sively looking for their prey, but the hen-hawk soars 

 like a creature of the air. The flight of martins is inter- 

 esting in the same way. When I was young and com- 

 1 [Bemarlcs on Forest Scenery.] 



