One of the leading songsters in this choir of the old Barkpeeling is
the purple finch or linnet. He sits somewhat apart, usually on a
dead hemlock, and warbles most exquisitely. He is one of our finest
songsters, and stands at the head of the finches, as the hermit at
the head of the thrushes. His song approaches an ecstasy, and, with
the exception of the winter wren's, is the most rapid and copious
strain to be heard in these woods. It is quite destitute of the
trills and the liquid, silvery, bubbling notes that characterize the
wren's; but there runs through it a round, richly modulated whistle,
very sweet and very pleasing. The call of the robin is brought in at
a certain point with marked effect, and, throughout, the variety is
so great and the strain so rapid that the impression is as of two or
three birds singing at the same time. He is not common here, and I
only find him in these or similar woods. His color is peculiar, and
looks as if it might have been imparted by dipping a brown bird in
diluted pokeberry juice. Two or three more dippings would have made
the purple complete. The female is the color of the song sparrow, a
little larger, with heavier beak, and tail much more forked.

In a little opening quite free from brush and trees, I step down to
bathe my hands in the brook, when a small, light slate-colored bird
flutters out of the bank, not three feet from my head, as I stoop
down, and, as if severely lamed or injured, flutters through the
grass and into the nearest bush. As I do not follow, but remain near
the nest, she _chips_ sharply, which brings the male, and I see it
is the speckled Canada warbler. I find no authority in the books for
this bird to build upon the ground, yet here is the nest, made
chiefly of dry grass, set in a slight excavation in the bank not two
feet from the water, and looking a little perilous to anything but