NIGHT IN CANOE AT BALL'S HILL 
1892 
at ember 7 
Night sounds 
Daybreak 
Snipe drums 
I spent last night in my canoe on the shore near 
the landing. For an hour or more after going to bed (at 10 
P.M., I lay awake listening for the night sounds but I heard 
only the rustling of Mice in the leaves, the intermittent 
rasping of wood borers in the wood-pile near me, the cease¬ 
less monotone of the tree crickets in the birches overhead, 
and every few minutes the lisping notes of migrating Warblers. 
The last did not seem to be passing in greater numbers 
than has been the case during most of the clear nights during 
the past two weeks, but very possibly there were many flying 
at so great a height that their feeble notes did not reach 
my ears for, as I shall presently relate, the country was 
flooded with migrants the next morning. 
After sleeping soundly through the night, I awoke 
just as day was breaking. There was no fog save a very 
little lying close to the surface of the water. The east 
was all aglow with rosy light while the moon, low down in 
the west, still sent its pale rays through openings in the 
foliage and silvered the sleeping meadows. 
The first sound that I heard was the- whistling of 
Duckfe* wings. Then suddenly from directly overhead and with 
startling clearness came the weird humming of a Snipe, and 
after an interval of a few seconds, during which I had an 
opportunity to convince myself that I was really awake, the 
bird drummed again very near me and then flew about low down 
