722 
While I was watching the bird a bobolink flew 
over my head, between me and the lark, and 
poured out his voluble and copious strain. 
« What a contrast,» I thought, «between the 
spluttering, tongue-tied lark, and the free, 
liquid, and varied song of the bobolink!» 
I heard of a curious fact in the life his- 
tories of these larks in the West. A Michigan 
woman once wrote me that her brother, who 
was an engineer on an express train that 
made daily trips between two Western cities, 
reported that many birds were struck by the 
engine every day, and killed—often as many 
THE CENTURY MAGAZINE. 
as thirty on a trip of sixty miles. Birds of 
many kinds were killed, but the most common 
was a bird that went in flocks, and the de- 
scription of which answered to the shore-lark. 
Since then I have read in a Minnesota news- 
paper that many shore-larks are killed by 
railroad locomotives in that State. It was 
thought that the birds sat behind the rails to 
get out of the wind, and on starting up in 
front of the advancing train were struck 
down by the engine. The Michigan engineer 
referred to thought that the birds gathered 
upon the track to earth their wings, or else to 
