This bird is noted, as I said, for his song. It is said to be as fine as that of the English skylark of which we hear so much. Perhaps his way of singing makes it still more interesting. He starts up on wing, flies a little one way, then the other, all the time going higher and higher. So he climbs on up, up, up, in a zigzag way, till he is fairly out of sight, all the time giving a wonderfully sweet song. It is not very loud, but of such a kind that it is heard when the bird is far out of sight. When he can no longer be seen, one may still follow him with a good field-glass. He will sing without stopping for fifteen or twenty minutes. Then suddenly he stops, closes his wings, and comes head first towards the ground. It seems as if he would dash his brains out against the earth, but just before he touches, he opens his wings and alights like a feather, almost where he started from. He should be as famous as the English bird, and will be, no doubt, when he is better known. One of the things which make bird-study so interesting to us is that there is so much to be found out about our birds. European birds have been studied much longer, but we have still many beautiful ones whose manners and ways of living are almost unknown. These things are left for you young folk to find out when you are grown up. FOOTNOTE: [8] See Appendix, 7. X THE WARBLER FAMILY (_Mniotiltidæ_)[9] THE gayest, the liveliest, and almost the smallest of our birds are the warblers. Some of them are not over five inches long from the tip of the beak to the end of the tail. Almost all wear bright colors, and the pair are never alike, while the youngsters are different from both. But few of them warble. Then why are they named so? Well, I haven't found out; but we must call them warblers because that is their name in the books. Most of them have funny little songs of a few notes, which they jerk out every minute as they scramble about on the trees. We have seventy species of these little birds in the United States, and every one is working as hard as he can from morning till night, for our benefit. For every one eats insects, and enormous numbers of them. Some scramble over trees and pick them out from bud and blossom and under leaves, others go over the bark, and others fly out like flycatchers. Some of them work in the tops of tall trees, others work in the orchards, some in bushes, and some on the ground. But wherever they live, they are beautiful to look at, and bewitching to study. Though they are little, they have plenty of spirit. I know of one kept in a room with several other birds, all bigger than himself. You might think he would be treated as big boys would treat a little one. But no, indeed! the tiny fellow made himself ruler of the whole party. He took the biggest bathing-dish, the best seed-cup, and the most desirable perch, and drove away any big bird who dared to claim either.