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This vireo is the very prince of stump-speakers, fluent, loud, and sarcastic, and is well called the politician, though it is a disappointment to learn that the title was given him, not for his eloquence, but on account of his habit of putting pieces of newspaper into his nest. While I stood peering into the thicket, a man whom I knew came along the road, and caught me thus disreputably employed.
"I do not think she believes anything. She can't until the things to believe in come to her. Mr. Vireo or you would make her see. I told her I would send somebody who had more for her than I." "You have told her the first message, that the kingdom is at hand. The Christ-errand must be done next. The full errand of help.
Yet the coming and going of the birds is more or less a mystery and a surprise. We go out in the morning, and no thrush or vireo is to be heard; we go out again, and every tree and grove is musical; yet again, and all is silent. Who saw them come? Who saw them depart?
Instantly I was transported to the deep woods and the trout brooks of my native Catskills. I heard the murmuring water and felt the woodsy coolness of those retreats such magic hath associative memories! A moment before a yellow-throated vireo sang briefly in the maple, a harsh note; and the oriole with its insistent call added to the disquieting sounds. I have no use for the oriole.
More common in my region than the jay or the cardinal is the red-eyed vireo. This creature moves industriously in and out among the leaves of our trees. It is persistently in motion, is nearly constant in song, and is a bird of fair size, being larger than our English sparrow, though smaller than a robin.
Then came others, Redtail the Hawk, Scrapper the Kingbird, Redwing the Blackbird, Drummer the Woodpecker, Welcome Robin, Tommy Tit the Chickadee, Jenny Wren, Redeye the Vireo, and ever so many more.
There is no flower in the world more exquisitely fashioned than this. It is the emblem of a rustic maid in the sweet prime of her morning. We were well content with our day's voyage and our parting camp on the river. We had done no harm; no accident had befallen us; we had seen many lovely things and heard music from warbler and vireo, thrush and wren, all day long.
Some observers say the catbird eats the eggs of the fly-catcher and other birds, but this must be seen to be believed. There comes an outbreak of melody from the top of a tall black willow, much like the tones of the robin and yet suggestive of the warbling vireo, but finer than the former, clearer, louder and richer than the latter.
But the leaves and the protective coloring of most nests baffle them as effectually, no doubt as they do the professional ooelogist. The nest of the red-eyed vireo is one of the most artfully placed in the wood. It is just beyond the point where the eye naturally pauses in its search; namely, on the extreme end of the lowest branch of the tree, usually four or five feet from the ground.
Like all the vireo tribe, they suspend their tiny baskets from the fork or crotch of a horizontal twig. The nest is somewhat bulkier than the compact little cup of the red-eyed vireo, and is apt to be more carefully concealed in the foliage, although I have found more than one nest that was hung in plain sight. I remember one in particular.
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