page [45] (seq. 46)

45
Cambridge & Waverly, Mass.
1900
May 13

A clear warm day, mercury rising to nearly
80° {degrees}. This morning I took the electrics
to Waverly reaching there at about 9.10. I then
walked down the track towards Clematis Brook
and the Reservation for about half a mile. The
brook flows at the foot of the embankment
and in the trees and bushes that border it
were innumerable birds filling the air with
music. Solitary Sandpipers were bobbing about
along the muddy stretches, occasionally rising
on quivering bowed wings and flying to another
spot, uttering their musical cry. Red-winged
Blackbirds filled the large swamp. The rusby
and cattails are about two feet high and the
beautiful green color of the fresh leaves is
a fine sight. The male Red-wings were busily
courting the females, chasing them about
and displaying their brilliant epaulettes.
At one spot I heard the rippling music of
a Winter Wren, a dainty little creature of
the northern woods, whose song once heard can
never be forgotten. He kept close to the
border of the brook among the bushes, and
his sweet music would come now from
directly in front of, and close to me, now
from twenty or thirty feet along the stream
first on my right, then on my left,
eluding my careful search. I know of no
bird that can hid[e] so successfully. He
is a tiny little bunch of brown, and I well
remember my first sight of him in the