The Vesper Sparrow

Length six inches.

Upper parts brown, streaked with dusty; some bright bay on the wings, but no yellow anywhere, and two white tail-feathers.

Under parts dull-white, striped on breast and sides with brown.

A Citizen of North America from Canada southward, nesting north of the Middle States.

A regular member of the guild of Weed Warriors, and in summer belonging also to the Seed Sowers and Ground Gleaners.

WHITE-THROATED SPARROW.

(THE PEABODY BIRD)

“The White-throat is another bird that you will not see in his summer home, unless you look for him in the Northern States.  You may find him nesting about the White Mountains, on or near the ground, with the Olive-backed Thrush and Winter Wren.  In other places he may be seen as a visitor any time in spring and autumn, or may even linger about the whole winter.  You remember the dead one Nat found, that we used when I was teaching you something about birds in general that rainy day, before I began to tell you the particular bird stories.

“If you think of Sparrows only as a sober, dusty-colored family, you may be surprised to learn that this large, handsome bird, with the white throat, the head striped with black and white, a yellow spot over the eye, and richly variegated brown feathers, is a member of that group.”

“It bothered me dreadfully at first,” said Rap, “until one fall some sportsmen, who came through the upper fields looking for Quail, whistled his song and told me about him.  There were lots of them here early this spring by the mill, but the miller didn’t like them because they pitched into his new-sown pasture and gobbled the grass-seed.”

“Yes, of course they eat grass-seed in spring, when the old weed seeds of autumn are well scattered; but surely we must give a Citizen Bird some good valuable food, not treating him like a pauper whom we expect to live always on refuse.

“Some morning in early spring, when the Chickadees who have wintered about the Farm are growing restless, and about ready to go to a more secluded spot to nest, you will hear a sweet persuasive whistling song coming from a clump of bushes.  What is it?  Not a Bluebird, or a Robin.  The notes are too short and simple for a Song Sparrow or a Thrush, too plaintive for a Wren, and too clear for a lisping Wood Warbler.

[Illustration:  White-Throated Sparrow.]

“Presently several White-throats fly down to a bit of newly seeded lawn or patch of wild grass, where they feed industriously for a few minutes, giving only a few little call-notes—­’t’sip, t’sip’—­by way of conversation.  Then one flies up into a bush and sings in a high key.  What does he say—­for the song of two short bars surely has words?  One person understands it one way, and thinks the bird says ‘all-day whittling, whittling, whittling!’ Some one else hears ‘pe-a—­peabody—­peabody—­peabody!’ While to me the White-throat always says ’I work—­cleverly, cleverly, cleverly—­poor me—­cleverly, cleverly, cleverly!’”