THE HORNED LARK 
By EDWARD HOWE FORBUSH 
The National Association of Audubon Societies 
Educational Leaflet No. 53 
It is November. On Martha’s 
Vineyard, a little island south of Cape 
Cod, the boiling surf pounds and 
roars along the lonely shore, shifting 
the sands upon the bars and rattling 
the cobbles on the cold, stony beaches. 
Surf-ducks dive and play amid the 
white-capped seas, while the Atlantic 
stretches away in the dim distance 
to the home of the east wind and the 
storm. 
Inland, among shrubby plains 
and rolling hills, nestles an isolated 
farm. Here in a weedy field, sheltered 
somewhat from the searching winds 
of the Atlantic, a flock of little brown 
birds creep in and out among the stub- 
NEST OF HORNED LARK ^le. They have come from their sum- 
Photographed by Ecbert s. Judd mer home, in bleak and barren Labra- 
dor, to their harvest home in this sea-girt isle. They are Eastern Horned 
Larks, the type of the species. 
It is April. The setting sun lies warm over the wide prairie-fields 
of Minnesota, and the light, free, south wind gently breathes the breath 
of life over an eager land. A little bird sits on her sunken nest in the 
prairie sod, watching her mate as he springs aloft and gives himself to 
the buoyant currents of the air. He swings in loose 
circuits and zigzags back and forth, singing gently at Song- 
first, then, fluttering upward, rises by stages, taking Flight 
each upward step at a steep slant, sailing, gyrating, mounting higher 
and still higher, pouring forth his whole soul in an ecstasy of song. 
Up and up he goes, swinging in dizzy spirals, pausing at one height 
after another to send back to earth his music ; and so soars and sings until 
he fades from view in the clear blue canopy of heaven, and the song is 
wafted down sweeter and fainter until, like the skylark, he sings at 
“heaven’s gate.” 
Then, as the full flood of his ecstasy begins to ebb, and his strength 
wanes, he sinks slowly down ; the far-away song swells on the listening" 
ear, and, still fluttering and singing, he comes again into view. Swing- 
