Middlesex Co., Mass. [Middlesex County, Massachusetts]
1875
Jan. 28 [January 28, 1875] as the Lyman place in Waltham
hoping to get some red grosbeaks.
  At the foot of Belmont hill I got
a shot at a lightish colored adlt [adult male], 
which with one in the slatey plumage
was feeding on the berries of the
buckthorn bushes, but unaccountably
missed them both although they
were within easy range and sitting
close together. Saw no more grosbeaks
during the forenoon, though at one
place I tied my horse and took
a tramp of a half mile or so among
the cedars. Robins are everywhere.
I saw them at three points, and
in one spot (foot of "Flagg staff" hill)
as many as 50 were sitting about
in the apple trees or chasing one
another in wanton playfulness. The 
attraction here consists in a small 
clump of the buckthorns on whose
clustering black berries they must
subsist almost entirely. The appear-
ance of these birds in such numbers
at so early a date, and especially at
the very height of the present un-
precedented cold period, must be
ranked among those mysterious
phenomena of bird migrations, about
which it is worse than useless to
theorize or conjecture. That there were
no more than a few isolated individuals
or small companies, scattered through
this section at the beginning of the present
month I am certain, now the country
is swarming with them. Yesterday