126 AT THE NORTH OF BEARCAMP WATER. 
on the upper curve of a boulder, the tip of a 
cedar, or some equally favorable point for see¬ 
ing and being seen. They are comparatively 
silent, but now and then their sweet “cheruit ” 
comes as a promise that after the long winter 
spring shall return, and with it their loveliness 
and courage. Many of the birds go south 
cheerfully, or indifferently, but the bluebirds 
seem to linger sadly and lovingly, and to feel 
that the migration is an enforced exile from the 
home they love best. 
The Chocorua country is not a good one for 
starlings and blackbirds; in fact, I have never 
seen but one bobolink nearer than Fryeburg 
intervales, twenty-five miles away; and with all 
my watching, no crow blackbird or meadow 
lark has ever caught my eye in this region. 
The old residents say that years ago, when flax 
was cultivated hereabouts and grain-fields were 
broader, these birds were present in large num¬ 
bers. The first flock of rusty grackles which I 
have ever seen here appeared this year on a hill¬ 
top, about the middle of the afternoon of Sep¬ 
tember 22. The birds were either very tame 
or very weary, for they remained in the tops of 
some locust-trees, while I not only stood beneath 
them, but shook their tree, called to them, and 
clapped my hands. They maintained a steady 
flow of sotto voce music charming to the ear. 
