Let me call the roll of the members of that feathered choir. First, and most gifted of all, were a couple of brown thrashers, whose tones were as strong and sweet as those of a silver cornet, making the echoes ring across the hollow. I have listened to many a thrasher song in the North, the South, and the West, but have never heard a voice of better timbre than that of one of the tawny vocalists singing that morning, as he sat on the topmost twig of an oak tree and flung out his medley upon the morning air. It is wonderful, anyway, with what an ecstasy the thrasher will sometimes sing. Nothing could be plainer than that he sings for the pure pleasure of it--an artist deeply in love with his art. Falling a little behind the thrashers in vocal power and technical execution were the catbirds, which sent up their cavatinas from the bushes in the hollow. Their voices lacked the volume and strength of their rivals, yet some of their strains were truly the quintessence of sweetness. Conspicuous members of the early chorus were the wood thrushes, a dozen or more of which were often singing at the same time. From every part of the woods their peals arose. Of course, there was no attempt--at least, so far as I could discover--to sing in concert, but each minstrel followed his own sweet will, and so the combined result was not what you would call a harmony, but a medley, albeit a very pleasing one. If the wood thrush's execution were less labored, he would certainly be a marvelous songster, and even as it is, he furnishes unending delight to those whose ears are trained to appreciate avian minstrelsy. Two or three rose-breasted grossbeaks piped their liquid, childlike arias; towhees, at least a half-dozen of them, flung forth their loud, explosive trills that have a real musical quality; several cardinals whistled as if they meant to drown out all the other voices; scarlet and summer tanagers drawled their good-natured tunes, while their rich robes gleamed in the level rays of the rising sun; running like silver threads through all the other music, could be heard the fine trills of the field sparrows; the swinging chant of the creeping warblers and the loud rattle of the Tennessee warblers ran high up in the scale, furnishing a gossamer tenor; that golden optimist, the Baltimore oriole, piped his cheery recitative in the tops of the trees; chickadees supplied the minor strains and tufted titmice the alto; four or five turtle doves soothed the ear with their meditative cooing; while the calls and songs of numerous jays and a few yellow-breasted chats made a kind of trombone accompaniment. Surely it is worth one's while to hie early to the haunts of the birds to hear such a tumult of song.