.

Around timber-line in summer one may hear the happy song of the
white-throated sparrow. Here and above lives the leucosticte. Far
above the vanguard of the brave pines, where the brilliant flowers
fringe the soiled remnants of winter's drifted snow, where sometimes
the bees hum and the painted butterflies sail on easy wings, the
broad-tailed hummingbird may occasionally be seen, while still higher
the eagles soar in the quiet bending blue. On the heights, sometimes
nesting at an altitude of thirteen thousand feet, is found the
ptarmigan, which, like the Eskimo, seems supremely contented in the
land of crags and snows.

Of all the birds on the Rockies, the one most marvelously eloquent is
the solitaire. I have often felt that everything stood still and that
every beast and bird listened while the matchless solitaire sang. The
hermit thrush seems to suppress one, to give one a touch of reflective
loneliness; but the solitaire stirs one to be up and doing, gives
one the spirit of youth. In the solitaire's song one feels all the
freshness and the promise of spring. The song seems to be born of ages
of freedom beneath peaceful skies, of the rhythm of the universe, of a
mingling of the melody of winds and waters and of all rhythmic sounds
that murmur and echo out of doors and of every song that Nature sings
in the wild gardens of the world. I am sure I have never been more
thoroughly wide awake and hopeful than when listening to the
solitaire's song. The world is flushed with a diviner atmosphere,
every object carries a fresher significance, there are new thoughts
and clear, calm hopes sure to be realized on the enchanted fields of
the future. I was camping alone one evening in the deep solitude
of the Rockies. The slanting sun-rays were glowing on St. Vrain's
crag-crowned hills and everything was at peace, when, from a near-by
treetop came the triumphant, hopeful song of a solitaire, and I forgot
all except that the world was young. One believes in fairies when the
solitaire sings. Some of my friends have predicted that I shall some
time meet with an accident and perish in the solitudes alone. If their
prediction should come true, I shall hope it will be in the
summer-time, while the flowers are at their best, and that during my
last conscious moments I shall hear the melody of the solitaire
singing as I die with the dying day.

I sat for hours in the woods one day, watching a pair of chickadees
feeding their young on