_April 26_.--At sunrise, the pure clear sound of the meadow lark. An
hour later, some notes, few and simple, yet delicious and perfect, from
the bush-sparrow-towards noon the reedy trill of the robin. To-day is
the fairest, sweetest yet--penetrating warmth--a lovely veil in the air,
partly heat-vapor and partly from the turf-fires everywhere in patches
on the farms. A group of soft maples near by silently bursts out in
crimson tips, buzzing all day with busy bees. The white sails of sloops
and schooners glide up and down the river; and long trains of cars, with
ponderous roll, or faint bell notes, almost constantly on the opposite
shore. The earliest wild flowers in the woods and fields, spicy arbutus,
blue liverwort, frail anemone, and the pretty white blossoms of the
bloodroot. I launch out in slow rambles, discovering them. As I go along
the roads I like to see the farmers' fires in patches, burning the dry
brush, turf, debris. How the smoke crawls along, flat to the ground,
slanting, slowly rising, reaching away, and at last dissipating. I like
its acrid smell--whiffs just reaching me--welcomer than French perfume.
The birds are plenty; of any sort, or of two or three sorts, curiously,
not a sign, till suddenly some warm, gushing, sunny April (or even
March) day--lo! there they are, from twig to twig, or fence to fence,
flirting, singing, some mating, preparing to build. But most of them _en
passant_--a fortnight, a month in these parts, and then away. As in all
phases, Nature keeps up her vital, copious, eternal procession. Still,
plenty of the birds hang around all or most of the season--now their
love-time, and era of nest-building. I find flying over the river,
crows, gulls and hawks. I hear the afternoon shriek of the latter,
darting about, preparing to nest. The oriole will soon be heard here,
and the twanging _meoeow_ of the cat-bird; also the king-bird, cuckoo
and the warblers. All along, there are three peculiarly characteristic
spring songs--the meadow-lark's, so sweet, so alert and remonstrating
(as if he said, "don't you see?" or, "can't you understand?")--the
cheery, mellow, human tones of the robin--(I have been trying for years
to get a brief term, or phrase, that would identify and describe that
robin call)--and the amorous whistle of the high-hole. Insects are out
plentifully at midday.
_April 29_.--As we drove lingering along the road we heard, just after
sundown, the song of the wood-thrush. We stopp'd without a word, and
listen'd long. The delicious notes--a sweet, artless, voluntary, simple
anthem, as from the flute-stops of some organ, wafted through the
twilight--echoing well to us from the perpendicular high rock, where, in
some thick young trees' recesses at the base, sat the bird--fill'd our
senses, our souls.