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I also noted the Canada warbler, the chestnut-sided warbler, and the black-throated blue-back, the latter most abundant of all. Up these mountain brooks, too, goes the belted kingfisher, swooping around through the woods when he spies the fisherman, then wheeling into the open space of the stream and literally making a "blue streak" down under the branches.
The finest songster among the Sylvia, according to my notions, is the black-throated greenback. Its song is sweet and clear, but brief. The rarest of the species are Swainson's warbler, said to be disappearing; the cerulean warbler, said to be abundant about Niagara; and the mourning ground warbler, which I have found breeding about the head-waters of the Delaware, in New York.
Smithers, still sepulchral, sang continually in a loud, cracked voice, never by any chance happening upon the right note. As Dorothy said, when there are only eight tones in the octave, it would seem that sometime, somewhere, a warbler must coincide for a brief interval with the tune, but as Dick further commented, industry and patience can do wonders when rightly exercised.
However, even this clever birdlet's dexterity is not equal to that of the nuthatch, for the latter is able to climb up and down a smoother wall than his little rival. More than that, the nuthatch glides downward with more ease and in a straight line, and does not fling himself from side to side as the warbler does.
Presently the singer hops up on a dry twig, and gives me a good view: lead-colored head and neck, becoming nearly black on the breast; clear olive-green back, and yellow belly. From his habit of keeping near the ground, even hopping upon it occasionally, I know him to be a ground warbler; from his dark breast the ornithologist has added the expletive mourning, hence the mourning ground warbler.
I doubt not that this crying cow-bird and cuckoo evil comes up as a matter of consideration in bird councils. The two-storied nest may yet become the fashion in featherdom, in which case the cow-bird and European cuckoo would be forced to build nests of their own or perish. But have we fully examined this nest of our yellow warbler?
As the bird paused a few yards from me, and began to chirp uneasily, my curiosity was at once excited. When I saw it was the female mourning ground warbler, and remembered that the nest of this bird had not yet been seen by any naturalist, that not even Dr. Brewer had ever seen the eggs, I felt that here was something worth looking for.
I had already heard nightingales in abundance near Lake Como, and had also listened to larks, but I had never heard either the blackbird, the song thrush, or the blackcap warbler; and while I knew that all three were good singers, I did not know what really beautiful singers they were.
The speckled Canada is a very superior warbler, having a lively, animated strain, reminding you of certain parts of the canary's, though quite broken and incomplete; the bird, the while, hopping amid the branches with increased liveliness, and indulging in fine sibilant chirps, too happy to keep silent. His manners are quite marked.
But finally I fixed its place in the avian schedule with the help of my field glass white under parts, slightly tinged with yellow, back and rump olive green, top and sides of head delicate bluish-ash; no eye-ring, no wing-bars. There is no other warbler marked quite like that.
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