His voice is the jocund and inspiring voice of a spring morning. It is like a ceaseless and hilarious clapping of hands. I was much interested in an account a friend gave me of the first skylark he heard while abroad. He had been so full of the sights and wonders of the Old World that he had quite forgotten the larks, when one day, as he was walking somewhere near the sea, a brown bird started up in front of him, and mounting upward began to sing. It drew his attention, and as the bird went skyward, pouring out his rapid and jubilant notes, like bees from a hive in swarming-time, the truth suddenly flashed upon the observer. "Good heavens!" he exclaimed, "that is a skylark; there is no mistaking that bird." It is this unique and unmistakable character of the lark's song, and its fountain-like sparkle and copiousness, that are the main sources of its charm. NOCTURNAL INSECTS How the nocturnal insects, the tree-crickets and katydids, fail as the heat fails! They are musicians that play fast or slow, strong or feeble, just as the heat of the season waxes or wanes; and they play as long as life lasts: when their music ceases, they are dead. The katydids begin in August, and cry with great vigor and spirit, "Katy-did," "Katydid," or "Katy-did n't." Toward the last of September they have taken in sail a good deal, and cry simply, "Katy," "Katy," with frequent pauses and resting-spells. In October they languidly gasp or rasp, "Kate," "Kate," "Kate," and before the end of the month they become entirely inaudible, though I suspect that if one's ear were sharp enough he might still hear a dying whisper, "Kate," "Kate." Those cousins of Katy, the little green purring tree-crickets, fail in the same way and at the same time. When their chorus is fullest, the warm autumn night fairly throbs with the soft lulling undertone. I notice that the sound is in waves or has a kind of rhythmic beat. What a gentle, unobtrusive background it forms for the sharp, reedy notes of the katydids! As the season advances, their life ebbs and ebbs: you hear one here and one there, but the air is no longer filled with that regular pulse-beat of sound. One by one the musicians cease, till, perhaps on some mild night late in October, you hear--just hear and that is all--the last feeble note of the last of these little harpers. LOVE AND WAR AMONG THE BIRDS