1892
Sept. 20
Concord, Massachusetts.
Mass.
Concord. A perfect September day, cloudless, calm with transparent
air and warm sun.
  Started alone for a walk at 3 p.m. Derby's lane very
beautiful the ferns already turned and much of the foliage
golden or russet. Robins hopping in the path, Jays screaming
& Crow's cawing. Squirrels dropping chestnut bits. Heard several
Warblers lisping & after some trouble got a good sight at
one, a D. striata. I also heard what I thought was the
creep of a Certhia and later, on my return, I saw the bird
climbing the trunk of a pitch pine.
[margin]First Brown Creeper[/margin]
  As I was passing through some alders something fluttered
among them and presently I discovered the bird, a
young Black-billed Cuckoo well able to fly but in the graying
first plumage with whitish mottling or squamate spots on
the back & wings.
[margin]Black-billed Cuckoo[/margin]
  Bow Meadow was surprisingly beautiful in the late
afternoon light. As I sat on the low ledge covered with rock
ferns & looked out over the cassandra bushes I heard only the
chirping of crickets & the occasional call of a Jay. Presently a
Junco, the first I have seen, flew up into a bush & tsup-ed
softly. Next a Chipmunk bustled down the slope making a
great rustling & on reaching the edge of the bog stopped
to drink from a pool covered with floating dry leaves.
Then a wood frog began to croak furiously as in spring and
after it had finished another took up the cry & then
still another. I closed my eyes & easily imagined the time to be
April instead of September. I do not remember to have
heard R. sylvatica in autumn before. H. pickeringii calling a
[margin]Wood Frog croaks[/margin]