BIRDS AND FLOWERS 



ABOUT 



CONCORD, NEW HAMPSHIRE. 

 * §r w 



THE FIRST ROBIN. 



It was about half past five on Sunday morning, 

 March 19, that I was aroused by a joyous whoop, 

 which prolonged itself into a series of anapaestic trip- 

 lets something like this: "Come, wake up! Come, 

 wake up! See, I'm here! See I'm here! Aren't you 

 glad? Aren't you glad?" The bird sang for fifteen 

 or twenty minutes with all the frenzy of a brown 

 thrasher, and it would seem as if his ecstatic carol 

 must have rolled over the whole North End. 



Usually I hear the robins some days before I see 

 them; probably, because, though they greet the dawn 

 from the treetops about our houses, they spend their 

 days in the fields or woods in search of food. But 

 this time the fields and woods evidently presented no 

 attractions. When I looked out about nine o'clock, 

 I beheld my musician sitting in the elm. He ap- 



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