that, however tired he may be, he is always more or less refreshed by
his journey. His physical tenement has taken an airing. His respiration
has been deepened, his circulation quickened. A good draught has
carried off the fumes and the vapors. One's quality is intensified; the
color strikes in. At noon that day I was much fatigued; at night I was
leg-weary and footsore, but a fresh, hardy feeling had taken possession
of me that lasted for weeks.



VIII

BIRDS'-NESTING

Birds's-nesting is by no means a failure, even though you find no
birds'-nests. You are sure to find other things of interest, plenty of
them. A friend of mine says that, in his youth, he used to go hunting
with his gun loaded for wild turkeys, and, though he frequently saw
plenty of smaller game, he generally came home empty-handed, because he
was loaded only for turkeys. But the student of ornithology, who is
also a lover of Nature in all her shows and forms, does not go out
loaded for turkeys merely, but for everything that moves or grows, and
is quite sure, therefore, to bag some game, if not with his gun, then
with his eye, or his nose, or his ear. Even a crow's nest is not amiss,
or a den in the rocks where the coons or the skunks live, or a log
where a partridge drums, or the partridge himself starting up with
spread tail, and walking a few yards in advance of you before he goes
humming through the woods, or a woodchuck hole, with well beaten and
worn entrance, and with the saplings gnawed and soiled about it, or the
strong, fetid smell of the fox, which a sharp nose detects here and