“I suppose by that you mean ‘yes,’” laughed the Doctor.  “Olive and I have planned to take the six-seated surrey, with a hamper of good things to eat, and drive down to the sandy shore where the river broadens into salt water.  There is a house on the bay where we can have our dinner, and the meadows and marshes are full of birds—­don’t quite smother me, Dodo!  Then in the cool of the afternoon we can return and have a picnic supper at some pretty place on the way, for to-morrow night the moon is full!”

“Can Rap go with us—­for he hardly ever gets down to the shore?”

“Certainly!”

“How far is it?” asked Nat.

“About fifteen miles by the road, though not more than ten in a straight line.”

“Are the birds different down there?”

“Some of them are; there is a great colony of Blackbirds I want you to see, for our next family is a very interesting one.  It contains a harlequin, a tramp, a soldier, a tent-maker, a hammock-maker, and a basket-maker; and we shall probably see them all, sooner or later, but certainly one or two of them to-morrow.

“No, I won’t tell you a word about them now.  But go down and invite Rap, and tell him we will call for him by half-past six o’clock in the morning, because we must have time to drive slowly, stop where we please, and use our eyes.”  Early next morning the party set out.  Five happy children—­the youngest eight and the oldest fifty-eight—­started from Orchard Farm behind a pair of comfortable white horses that never wore blinkers or check-reins.  These big members of the party were human enough to look around as the children scrambled into the surrey, and then prick up their ears as if they knew the difference between a picnic and a plough, and were happy accordingly.

They trotted down the turnpike a mile, and then turned into a cross-road bordered by hay-fields almost ready for cutting.  Olive was driving, for she loved the old white horses.  Rap, Nat, and Dodo sat in the middle seat, and the Doctor behind.

“Please, Doctor, what is the name of the Bird family we are going to visit?” asked Rap.

“The family of the Blackbirds and Orioles; but it has a Latin name, Icteridae, when it walks in the procession.”

“Listen! listen!” cried Dodo.  “Oh, Olive, do stop; there’s some kind of a bird on top of those bars that is singing as if he had started and couldn’t stop, and I’m sure his voice will fly away from him in a minute!”

Olive said “whoa” immediately.

“It’s only a Bobolink!” said Rap, as the bird spread his wings and soared into the air still singing, leaving a little stream of music behind him, as a dancing canoe leaves a train of ripples in the water.

“It is a Bobolink, surely,” said the Doctor, “and not ‘only a Bobolink,’ but the very bird we should be most glad to see—­the first of the Blackbird and Oriole family—­the harlequin in his summer livery.”