It was too dark for me to see what was going on, but as
I brushed against the close branches the robins set up a lively
cackling, and presently commenced flying from tree to tree before me as
I advanced, though plainly with no intention of deserting their
quarters. The place was full of them, but I could form no estimate of
their number.

On the following evening I took my stand upon a little knoll commanding
the western end of the wood. According to my notes, the birds began to
arrive about sunset,--but this was pretty certainly an error,--and
though I did not undertake an exact count until the flight was mainly
over, it seemed likely that at least three hundred passed in at that
point. This would have made the total number twelve hundred, or
thereabout, on the assumption that my outlook had covered a quarter of
the circuit. After the flight ceased I went into the wood, and from the
commotion overhead it was impossible not to believe that such a
calculation must be well within the truth.

The next day was rainy, but on the evening of the 28th I stood by the
shore of the pond, on the eastern side of the wood, and made as accurate
a count as possible of the arrivals at that point. Unfortunately I was
too late; the robins were already coming. But in fifty minutes, between
6.40 and 7.30, I counted 1072 birds. They appeared singly and in small
flocks, and it was out of the question for me to make sure of them all;
while I was busy with a flock on the right, there was no telling how
many might be passing in on the left. If my observations comprehended a
quarter of the circle, and if the influx was equally great on the other
sides (an assumption afterward disproved), then it was safe to set the
whole number of birds at five thousand or more. Of the 1072 actually
seen, 797 came before the sunset gun was fired,--a proportion somewhat
larger than it would have been had the sky been clear.

On the afternoon of the 29th I again counted the arrivals at the eastern
end; but though I set out, as I thought, in good season, I found myself
once more behind time. At 6.30 robins were already dropping in,
notwithstanding the sky was cloudless. In the first five minutes
eighteen birds appeared; at sunset 818 had been counted; and at 7.30,
when I came away, the figures stood at 1267. "The robins came more
rapidly than last night," I wrote in my notebook, "and for much of the
time I could keep watch of the southeastern corner only. My visi