THE WATER-BIRDS.
charcoal burner, coming down from the hills with his dusky load, after the first light snow, tells of the Wild Geese that passed over his clearing the night before, and settled on the Forge Pond, and that when long John Hunt went after them in the morning, his gun kicked and knocked him into the worse bog hole; whereupon the whole flock flew away, laughing fit to kill themselves; and adding with a hoarse chuckle, "Sarved him right, too; never gives nuthin' he gits to neighbours, allers sends 'em to N'York."
In November and December, the hardy but inedible Sea Ducks return from the north, and settle noisily in their winter quarters; and all through the fall the lighthouse-keeper sends ashore some of the rarer migrants that, dazed and storm-blown, have dashed to death against his tower; and, as a bird-lover, he will find you out. If, in the autumn or early winter, you should chance to spend a little time among the lakes, or along the real sea-coast, from Massachusetts southward to the Chesapeake, a new pathway of delight will stretch before you, — read of the Sea-birds that Celia Thater entertained at Appledore in her Island Gar-den. And now that many people take their outings about the eastern shore, overrunning the pleasant islands, you too, may see the summer nesting of the Gulls and Terns, birds that before you had considered mysterious wanderers from the north.
These Water-birds, that count space as nothing and distance the swiftest locomotive in their flight, ever on the wing from the very necessities of their existence, always bring with them some of the atmosphere of their native haunts. The Wild Ducks, hanging in the market-stall, still wear on their wings a patch of rainbow colour, as if stamped there by the sun and mist through which they took their first flight. Call these birds songless, give them any names you please, they will remain mysteries, coming out of the sky and disappearing again in its horizon, pushing on to an invisible haven; because their homes are so remote we do not realize that they are like other birds, and we forget, when the garden trees are full of nests and sway
23
