Concord, Mass.
1901.
July 13
(No 3)
  Shortly after daybreak, two or three mornings since,
a Crow alighted in the oaks within a few rods of
my cabin and uttered a dozen times or more at
intervals of three or four seconds a soft, low, musical
crooning cock, oo-oo, or. I do not remember to have
ever heard this call before. It was so un-crow-like
that I should not have suspected the identity of the
author of the sound had he not also given the
kloc-kloc-kloc & the rattle. The last is not unlike
the sound made by rapidly drawing the point of a
cane across the polings of a fence.
  Gilbert on visiting the farm to-day saw there
four Phoebees, two at the pump in front of the
house, the other two at the barn feeding young
well growth and feathered in a nest under the eaves.
This is the second nest that these birds have built
the present season the first, in the barn cellar,
having been deserted and, I think, robbed of its eggs
although it was empty every time I examined it.
  Squirrels are numerous this year. The Grays are
fully up to their usual standard as to numbers, the 
Red considerably above it, while there are very many
more Chipmunks than I have seen in any season
for several years past. Last summer I stipulated
with Bensen that hereafter he should keep only one
cat instead of ten or a dozen. Perhaps this may
account for the marked increased in the number
of Squirrels in my woods throughout which the Bensen
Cats used to range far & wide.
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