A voice from outer darkness, clear and plain, 
Proclaims the feathered songster’s glad refrain 
As cheerily he warbles while I write.” 
There are other neighborly birds not mentioned else- 
where in this book, that may be seen in the trees, on the 
parking strips, on the fence corners, or along the telephone © 
wires or poles at times. Probably the commonest in 
migration are golden-crowned sparrows, heard in April or 
May. Then those lovers of the thistle seeds, the willow 
goldfinch and the western chipping sparrows, with their 
chestnut crowns may be often met, while the western night- 
hawk was seen playing tag with a dog in the twilight in a 
suburb of Yakima, Washington. The awkward body, short 
neck and big head of the western belted kingfisher does not 
always keep to the shores of fresh and salt water, for a — 
rattling trill attracted attention to one, as he sat perched on 
a telephone wire not far from the capitol i in Olympia, Wash- 
ington, keeping tab, ‘perhaps on the legislators during a 
session. ‘ His stay was short, but he gave a fine exhibition 
of his powerful flight; quick, jerky wings kept well below 
the level of his body, as he rushed away to the nest, pro- 
bably dug in some sandy bank of the bay. 
Often the northwestern flicker on the west and the 
red-shafted flicker on the east side of the Cascade range 
may remind the people, who once lived on the other side of — 
the Rocky Mountains, of the yellowshafted flicker of an 
old home. Some there are, who will see his huge body, 
squatted awkwardly on its short legs in an unkept parking 
_ strip, or braced by the sharp, stiff tail feathers against a 
tree trunk, and will recognize a woodpecker, and some may 
watch a fond mother feeding her baby who is too young to 
flit. His liking for ordinary ants, and also for the termites 
which are so numerous in August, (this representative of 
- the so-called white ants) is causing these birds to forsake 
the trees, but not the house tops and gables where he so 
at 
