The Architect and myself decided to travel once again, later in the
season, to the mountain, in the hope that we might make a better
nesting record. We reached the cabin on June 17th, and again found
ourselves back in spring. The peepers were still calling, and there
were wild lilies-of-the-valley in the woods, and pink rose-hearted
twin-flowers, with their scent of heliotrope. Everywhere grew the
dwarf cornel, or bunch-berry, with its four white petals--the smallest
of the dogwoods, which grows only a few inches high.
The first nest was found by me. It was built on a foundation of tiny
twigs in a bush, and had a two-story effect, the upper story being
made of fine grass. As I came near the bush, a magnificent
chestnut-sided warbler, with the bay patches on his sides and his
yellow crown, made such an outcry that I suspected the nest and
finally found it. There were three eggs in it and one tiny young bird,
smaller than a bumblebee. Everywhere grew the beautiful northern
azalea, of a clear pink with a perfume like sandal-wood. The Canadian
warbler, with its black necklace on its yellow breast, sang everywhere
a song which sounded like, "Ea-sy, ea-sy, you, you"; and we heard also
the orange-throated Blackburnian warbler's wiry, thin notes.
Near the top of the mountain are two sphagnum bogs, difficult to find,
but the home of many a rare bird. We finally located the larger of
these bogs, and there the Artist made the great discovery of the day.
Right out from underneath his foot, as he splashed through the wet
moss, flew a yellow-bellied flycatcher, which gives a note like the
wood-pewee and whose nest had been found only once before in the state
of Pennsylvania. Right in front of him, hidden in the deep moss, was
this long-sought nest. It was set deep in club-moss and lined with
white pine-needles, and contained four pinkish-white eggs with an
aureole around the larger end, with light rufous markings. It was so
overshadowed with wintergreen leaves and aronia and bunch-berries
that, even after the Artist had pointed out the place to me, it was
with very great difficulty that I found it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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