112 



Up the Creek 



on the grass. What did he think of us ? Eat- 

 ing, with him, is so different a matter, and per- 

 haps he could give us a few useful hints. The 

 trite remark, " Fingers came before forks," 

 has a significance in the woods, if not in the 

 town. While eating we listened, and I heard 

 the voices of nine different birds. Some 

 merely chirped in passing, it is true, but the 

 marsh-wrens in the cat-tail thicket just across 

 the creek were not silent for a moment. 

 Here in the valley of the Delaware, as I re- 

 cently found them on the shores of Chesa- 

 peake Bay, the wrens are quite nodlurnal, and 

 I would have been glad to have heard them 

 sing in the moonlight again ; for our enthu- 

 siasm would have been strengthened by a few 

 such glimpses of the night side of Nature. 



No bird is so welcome to a mid-day camp 

 as the white-eyed vireo, and we were fortu- 

 nate in having one with us while we tarried 

 at the spring. Not even ninety degrees in 

 the shade has any efFeft upon him, and this 

 unflagging energy readls upon the listener. 

 We could at least be so far alive as to give 

 him our attention. Mid-day heat, however, 

 does affeft many a song-bird, and now that 

 nesting is well-nigh over, the open woods 



