1893 
May 18                                                                                                         
East Lexington, Mass.
  Cloudy with rather stormy S.W. wind dying at                                                          
sunset and afterwards changing to N. and blowing hard
& cold through the night.
  In the early morning I heard a Water Thrush and
a Warbling Vireo singing near the hotel. Rose at
6.30 and breakfast at 7. At 7.30 Faxon joined 
me by appointment and we started at once for
the pond. The hotel landlord supplied us with a
large, heavy, flat bottomed boat square at both ends
while I propelled very slowly & laboriously by sculling
there being only one oar. In this way we crossed
the pond lengthways seeing or hearing a number of
Greebes, a Florida Gallinule, a Least Bittern, several
Carolina & Virginia Rails, and a very large number
of Red-wings. Swarms of Bank Swallows with a few
Barn Swallows and an occasional Eave or White belled
Swallow were skimming low over the water & now
& then a Swift dashed past. We saw a Kingfisher,
also.
[margin]Upper 
Reservoir pond[/margin]
  Landing we watched the Gallinules & Greebes for about
an hour and then followed up the brook which
empties into the pond for half a mile or more passing
through several pretty little meadows surrounded by
thickets of birch & alder and finally reaching a
low hill covered with birches, oaks & white pines, all
young trees 20 to 30 ft. tall. The brook flows half
around the base of this hill. There is nothing peculiar                            
about the place but Faxon considers it unusually
good ground for birds and it did not fail us to-day.
Indeed the numbers & variety of birds that it contained
[margin]a favored
nook for
birds.[/margin]