ing wood warblers. A problem not yet solved by ornithologists is:
what was the mode of life of the ancestor of the many warblers? Did he
cling to and creep along the bark, as the black-and-white warbler, or feed
from the ground or the thicket as does the worm-eating? Did he snatch
flies on the wing as the necklaced Canadian warbler, or glean from the
brook's edge as our water thrush? The struggle for existence has not been
absent from the lives of these light-hearted little fellows, and they have
had to be jack-of-all-trades in their search for food.

The gnats and other flying insects have indeed to take many chances when
they slip from their cocoons and dance up and down in the warm sunlight!
Lucky for their race that there are millions instead of thousands of them;
for now the swifts and great numbers of tree and barn swallows spend the
livelong day in swooping after the unfortunate gauzy-winged motes, which
have risen above the toad's maw upon land, and beyond the reach of the
trout's leap over the water.

It would take an article as long as this simply to mention hardly more
than the names of the birds that we may observe during a walk in May; and
with bird book and glasses we must see for ourselves the bobolinks in the
broad meadows, the cowbirds and rusty blackbirds, and, pushing through the
lady-slipper marshes, we may surprise the solitary great blue and the
little green herons at their silent fishing.

No matter how late the spring may be, the great migration host will reach
its height from the tenth to the fifteenth of the month. From this until
June first, migrants will be passing, but in fewer and fewer numbers,
until the balance comes to rest again, and we may cease from the strenuous
labours of the last few weeks, confident that those birds that remain will
be the builders of the nests near our homes--nests that they know so well
how to hide. Even before the last day of May passes, we see many young
birds on their first weak-winged flights, such as bluebirds and robins;
but June is the great month of bird homes, as to May belong the migrants.

Robins and mocking birds that all day long
Athwart straight sunshine weave cross-threads of song.
Sidney Lanier.

ANIMAL FASHIONS

Warm spring days bring other changes than thawing snowbanks and the
swelling buds and leaves, which seem to grow almost visibly. It is
surprising how many of