CONCORD 
1897 
Anril 1-5 
Accipiter 
cooperii 
chases a 
Prxrt ridge 
Song of 
Spizella. 
monticola 
On the afternoon of the 4th I started a very blue- 
beaked male Cooper's Hawk from an oak near Bensen's Landing. 
Crossing the open field it disappeared among the pines 
on the crest of Ball's Hill. Returning the same way fully 
an hour later I flushed a large cock Partridge which also 
flew towards the pines just mentioned. Less than a minute 
after it had passed beyond my sight, it reappeared, coming 
directly back over my head with the Cooper's Hawk in hot 
pursuit but fully one hundred yards in the rear. The 
Partridge went fully three yards to the Hawk's one and 
had disappeared in the woods towards Holden's Hill before 
the Hawk came to where I was standing but the latter bird 
kept steadily on its track like a hound on a keen scent 
and I notieed that when it came to a certain treetop 
around which the Partridge had curved sharply it took 
exactly the same curve. I do not believe, however, that 
it caught the Partridge. 
The song of the Tree Sparrow has been constantly 
ringing in my ears these past few days. Despite its 
exquisite melody, it goes ill with these surroundings. 
If I close my eyes while listening, I am at once transported 
to the far North and by the slightest effort of the 
imagination can see about me the wide, barren tundra, 
half shrouded in sea fog, carpeted with gray mosses and 
dotted with clusters of stunted spruces. Such a wild, 
plaintive voice has no place in these soft meadows and half- 
cultured woodlands. Alas! I fear it will not be heard here 
many days longer. 
