1891
May 23
(No 5)
Canoe trip on Concord River.
Mass
Concord to Wayland. - little difficulty in getting at it
by throwing a rope over the branch and pulling
it down sufficiently low to be reached from the
top of a reeds tripod which we made by
lashing the ends of three sticks together. There
were three eggs and a young bird just hatched
so we did not molest it. The female came with 
food for the young and entered the nest when
the male perched literally on the rim and sang,
a pretty sight.
  Spelman discovered a Flicker's nest in a singular
place - in a vertical slit 8 inches long by 2 in.
wide in the side of an apple tree. The bottom of
the slit was only 30 inches above the ground.
The interior cavity narrowed as it descended
so that I found it impossible to force my
hand and wrist down far enough to reach
the four pink-tinted white eggs which lay in
plain sight on the usual bed of chips at the
bottom. There were no signs of any enlargement
by the Woodpecker except at the bottom where
a rounded space had been chiseled out.
[margin]Curious Flicker's nest[/margin]
  At 1 P.M. we hoisted sail and started on
our way. The wind had now hauled well
into the east but we made the lower
Wayland bridge without being obliged to
paddle more than a few hundred yards in
all. Soon after entering the great Sudbury Meadows
Spelman, who was leading, started a Florida
Gallinule. It rose from a bed of tall, dark green,
round-stemmed rushes on the edge of the river
[margin]Gallinule[/margin]