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Updated: June 21, 2025
Still another bird incident that is stamped upon my memory must have occurred about the same time. Some of my brothers and an older boy neighbor and I were walking along a road in the woods when a brown bird flew down from a bush upon the ground in front of us. "A brown thrasher," the older boy said. It was doubtless either the veery, or the hermit thrush, and this was my first clear view of it.
Traversing remote mountain-roads through dense woods, I have repeatedly seen the veery, or Wilson's thrush, sitting upon her nest, so near me that I could almost take her from it by stretching out my hand. Birds of prey show none of this confidence in man, and, when locating their nests, avoid rather than seek his haunts.
The Red Mavis, or Thrush, is most musical in the early part of the season, when he first arrives, or in the month of May; the Veery is most vocal in June, and the Wood-Thrush in July; the Cat-Bird begins early and sings late, and fills out with his quaint notes the remainder of the singing season, after the others have become silent.
We like the birds which serve our purpose. We admire the brilliant plumage of the jay, cardinal and goldfinch. We love the mellow notes of the woodthrush, and of the veery, the clear, rollicking outpourings of the bobolink, the musical love song of the brown thrasher, the cheerful scolding of the wren.
He then opened a glass case, took out six birds, and stood them on the window-sill. "See, this is the way they go arm in arm when they walk in the great procession of Bird families: "The Bluebird and the Robin; "The Wood Thrush and the Veery; "The Hermit and the Olive-back. "Rap, my boy, look at each one and see if you can remember some of the differences between them.
"When we return to the house," said the Doctor, "I will show you the Veery and Hermit Thrush also; for whether or not you will hear the Hermit sing will depend very much upon what part of North America you live or travel in, and this bird's song is its chief claim to fame. Through all the southern and middle parts of the States he only pays visits during the fall, winter, and early spring.
A great charm in his song is that it rarely bursts upon your notice; it appears to steal into your consciousness, and in a moment the air seems full of his breezy, woodsy music, his "quivering, silvery song," as Cheney calls it. Not long were we allowed to meditate upon the charms of the veery, for again the luring song began, the other side of the belt of woods, and off we started anew.
I see by his impulsive, graceful movement, and his dimly speckled breast, that it is a thrush. Presently he utters a few soft, mellow, flute-like notes, one of the most simple expressions of melody to be heard, and scuds away, and I see it is the veery, or Wilson's thrush.
I was not only nearer to some of those which commonly frequent the garden and the orchard, but to those wilder and more thrilling songsters of the forest which never, or rarely, serenade a villager, the wood-thrush, the veery, the scarlet tanager, the field-sparrow, the whippoorwill, and many others.
If I had not, through two summers' close study, made myself very familiar with the various calls and cries of the veery, I think I should be driven wild by them; for no bird that I know can impart such distance to his notes, and few can get around so silently and unobserved as he.
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