82
1897
May 27
Lake Umbagog.
  Although the wind was north west the whole day rain fell
continuously and heavily from daylight to later into the night. Indeed
it was one of the heaviest storms of this exceptionally wet season.
  I spent most of the day on the boat but later in
the afternoon paddled across to the Gibbs farm where I
landed and called on the owner. He tells me that every
one of the sixteen compartments in the Martin box on his
shed is occupied. A dozen or more Martins were cowering
on the ledges of the box looking very wet and very
wretched.
[margin]Colony of
Purple Martins
at Gibbs 
farm.[/margin]
  The Eave Swallows are just beginning to build. A few
of their nests - perhaps a dozen - have withstood the
winter storms and are in perfect condition. Gibbs
says a great many fall every summer. He thinks
the birds "cannot find the right kind of wood".
[margin]Colony of 
Eave Swallows
at Gibbs
farm.[/margin]
  A fine male Marsh Hawk was c[?]ing over the
fields near the house and seven Crow Blackbirds
were feeding on a piece of newly planted ground.
[margin]Marsh Hawks,
Bronzed 
Grackles[/margin]
  All day long the bay near our anchorage was
alive with Barn, Eave, Tree and Bank Swallows with
a number of Swifts, in all three or four hundred
birds but not a Martin among them. They skimmed
close over the water catching insects just above it or
frequently picking them from the glassy surface. It
tired both eye and brain to watch them long as they
quartered back & forth turning & doubling back, crossing &
recrossing each others lines of flight in an interminable
merry dance. Thin wreaths of mist driving over the water
at the time making the birds look as large as Pigeons, in 
the distance.
[margin]Swallows
over the
Lake[/margin]