colors of the spirit.

If I name every bird I see in my walk, describe its color and ways,
etc., give a lot of facts or details about the bird, it is doubtful if
my reader is interested. But if I relate the bird in some way to human
life, to my own life,--show what it is to me and what it is in the
landscape and the season,--then do I give my reader a live bird and
not a labeled specimen.

J. B.
1895.

WAKE-ROBIN

I

THE RETURN OF THE BIRDS

Spring in our northern climate may fairly be said to extend from the
middle of March to the middle of June. At least, the vernal tide
continues to rise until the latter date, and it is not till after the
summer solstice that the shoots and twigs begin to harden and turn to
wood, or the grass to lose any of its freshness and succulency.

It is this period that marks the return of the birds,--one or two of
the more hardy or half-domesticated species, like the song sparrow
and the bluebird, usually arriving in March, while the rarer and more
brilliant wood-birds bring up the procession in June. But each stage
of the advancing season gives prominence to the certain species, as to
certain flowers. The dandelion tells me when to look for the swallow,
the dogtooth violet when to expect the wood-thrush, and when I have
found the wake-robin in bloom I know the season is fairly inaugurated.
With me this flower is associated, not merely with the awakening of
Robin, for he has been awake for some weeks, but with the universal
awakening and rehabilitation of nature.

Yet the coming and going of the birds is more or less a mystery and a
surprise. We go out in the morning, and no thrush or vireo is to be
heard; we go out again, and every tree and grove is musical; yet
again, and all is silent. Who saw them come? Who saw them depart?

This pert little winter wren, for instance, darting in and out the
fence, diving under the rubbish here and coming up yards away,--how
does he manage with those little circular wings to compass degrees and
zones, and arrive always in the nick of time? Last August I saw him in
the remotest wilds of the Adirondacks, impatient and inquisitive as
usual; a few weeks later, on the Potomac, I was greeted by the same
hardy little busybody. Does he travel by easy stages from bush to bush
and from wood to wood? or has that compact little body force and
courage to brave the night and the upper air, and so achieve leagues
at one pull?

And yonder