Concord, Mass.
1896
April 14
[April 14, 1896]

  Much cooler the forenoon cloudy with a chill N.E. [Northeast] wind,
the afternoon calm with occasional glympses [glimpses] of the sun
through thin clouds.
  To Ball's Hill at 9 a.m. spending the day, as usual, at
the cabin & roaming about the woods.
  The warm wave of yesterday has had a most marked effect
on the birds. The country was simply alive with them to-day.
Indeed I have seldom observed such a sudden and material
increase in so short a time at this season. The arrivals
were Yellow Palm Warblers (12 to 15), Ruby crowned Kinglets (2 or 3)
Yellow rump Warbler [Yellow-rumped Warbler] (1) Swamp Sparrows (2), Savanna Sparrow (1),
Barn Swallow (2), Wilson's Snipe (1) Field Sparrow (2)
But this list does not tell the whole tale. The number of
Robins, Song Sparrows, Grass Finches, Phoebes, Pine Warblers
had increased from two to five or six fold and as for
White-bellied Swallows I saw not less than three hundred.
In fact the last-named birds covered the whole of the
Great Meadows as well as the meadows below Ball's Hill
flying close over the water in swarms wherever the
wooded points gave shelter from the east wind and
scattered about numerously enough over the more exposed
portions of the meadow. It was delightful to see these
graceful birds in such numbers, reminding me of old
times when they used to congregate similarly above Fresh
Pond. If they were so numerous here to-day what must
have been their abundance on the Sudbury Marshes. Among
them I saw at least one pair of Barn Swallows.
  On the Great Meadows about opposite the Holt I saw
what I at first took for a number of mounds of mud
left by the ice. A rather careful scrutiny through my