not far away. So far as I could determine, this fellow is as
garrulous a churl and bully as his yellow-breasted cousin so well known
in the East. (Afterwards I found the chats quite numerous at Boulder.)
At length we scaled the cliffs, and presently stood on the edge of the
mesa, which we found to be a somewhat rolling plateau, looking much like
the plains themselves in general features, with here and there a hint of
verdure, on which a herd of cattle were grazing. The pasture was the
buffalo grass. Does the bird-lover ask what species dwell on a treeless
mesa like this? It was the home of western grassfinches, western
meadow-larks, turtle doves, desert horned larks, and a little bird that
was new to me, evidently Brewer's sparrow. Its favorite resort was in
the low bushes growing on the border of the mesa and along the edge of
the cliff. Its song was unique, the opening syllable running low on the
alto clef, while the closing notes constituted a very respectable
soprano. A few extremely shy sparrows flitted about in the thickets of a
hollow as we began our descent, and I have no doubt they were Lincoln's
sparrows.

The valley and the irrigated plain were the birds' elysium. Here we
first saw and heard that captivating bird, the lark bunting, as will be
fully set forth in the closing chapter. This was one of the birds that
had escaped me in my first visit to Colorado, save as I had caught
tantalizing glimpses of him from the car-window on the plain beyond
Denver, and when I went south to Colorado Springs, I utterly failed to
find him. It has been a sort of riddle to me that not one could be
discovered in that vicinity, while two years later these birds were
abundant on the plains both east and west of Denver. If Colorado Springs
is a little too far south for them in the summer, Denver is obviously
just to their liking. No less abundant were the western meadow-larks,
which flew and sang with a kind of lyrical intoxication over the green
alfalfa fields.

One morning we decided to walk some distance up Clear Creek Canyon. At
the opening of the canyon, Brewer's blackbirds were scuttling about in
the bushes that broidered the steep banks of the tumultuous stream, and
a short distance up in the gorge a lazuli bunting sat on a telegraph
wire and piped his merry lay. Soon the canyon narrowed, grew dark and
forbidding, and the steep walls rose high on both sides, compelling the
railway to creep like a half-imprisoned serpent a