62 Birds Every Child Should Know 
likes best to live! And how quickly he hops from 
twig to twig and flies from one clump of bushes 
to another clump, in restless, warbler fashion, 
as he leads you a dance dn pursuit! Not for 
a second does he stop watching you. 
If you come too close, a sharp piUpit or chock 
is snapped out by the excited bird, whose fa- 
miliar, oft-repeated, sprightly, waltzing triplet 
has been too freely translated, he thinks, into, 
Fol4ow~me, fol-low~me, fol4ow-me. Pursuit is 
the last thing he really desires, and of course he 
issues no such invitation. What he actually 
says almost always sounds to me like Witch- 
ee4ee, witch-ee-tee, witch-ee4ee. You will surely 
hear him if you listen in his marshy retreats. 
He sings almost all summer. Except when 
nesting he comes into the garden, picks minute 
insects out of the blossoming shrubbery, hops 
about on the ground, visits the raspberry tangle, 
and hides among the bushes along the roadside. 
Only the yellow warbler, of all his numerous 
tribe, is disposed to be more neighbourly. In 
spite of his local name, he is to be found in winter 
from Georgia to Labrador and Manitoba west- 
ward to the Plains. You see he is something of 
a traveller. 
The little bird who bewitches him, and to 
whom he sings the witch’s song, wears no black 
mask, so it is not easy to name her if her mate is 
not about. Her plumage is duller than his and 
