ace or two, now skulking in the
low stubble, just as I had observed them when a boy."

A month later, March 4th, is this note:--

"After the second memorable inaguration of President Lincoln, took my
first trip of the season. The afternoon was very clear and warm,--real
vernal sunshine at last, though the wind roared like a lion over the
woods. It seemed novel enough to find within two miles of the White
House a simple woodsman chopping away as if no President was being
inaugurated! Some puppies, snugly nestled in the cavity of an old
hollow tree, he said, belonged to a wild dog. I imagine I saw the
'wild dog,' on the other side of Rock Creek, in a great state of grief
and trepidation, running up and down, crying and yelping, and looking
wistfully over the swollen flood, which the poor thing had not the
courage to brave. This day, for the first time, I heard the song of
the Canada sparrow, a soft, sweet note, almost running into a warble.
Saw a small, black velvety butterfly with a yellow border to its
wings. Under a warm bank found two flowers of the houstonia in bloom.
Saw frogs' spawn near Piny Branch, and heard the hyla."

Among the first birds that make their appearance in Washington is the
crow blackbird. He may come any time after the 1st of March. The birds
congregate in large flocks, and frequent groves and parks, alternately
swarming in the treetops and filling the air with their sharp jangle,
and alighting on the ground in quest of food, their polished coats
glistening in the sun from very blackness as they walk about. There is
evidently some music in the soul of this bird at this season, though
he makes a sad failure in getting it out. His voice always sounds as
if he were laboring under a severe attack of influenza, though a large
flock of them, heard at a distance on a bright afternoon of early
spring, produce an effect not unpleasing. The air is filled with
crackling, splintering, spurting, semi-musical sounds, which are like
pepper and salt to the ear.

All parks and public grounds about the city are full of blackbirds.
They are especially plentiful in the trees about the White House,
breeding there and waging war on all other birds. The occupants of one
of the offices in the west wing of the Treasury one day had their
attention attracted by some object striking violently against one of
the window-panes. Looking up, they beheld a crow blackbird pausing in
midair, a few feet from the window. On the br