Carlyle, Mass. 1872 April 30 Song of the Woodcuck Watern sky mounting straight up; whitea haghtrund and as he started downward I lost him beest than began his song and almost indescribable warbling mixture of liquid melodious words; as the song ceased and the bird dropped to the ground I was almost brich myself with spectant & pleased and listened breathless for another repetition. After having him go off several times Mr. S. said that if we ran directly to the spot where he saw I couldnd on this before he came down we should hear a note that but few had ever listened to as it was and still further few yards off. This we tried & starting at full speed when the bird got up, we succeeded in reaching ourselves in a large ground jumper on the edge of a little springy lake just as the last notes of the Woodcuck's song died away in their overhead and the bird dropped within five yards of us, the rustling of feathers being distinctly audible as it closed its wings. There we lay for a half hours or more listening to its strange vibrating cry & occasionally catching each instant glimpses of its form as it rested on the brown grass within a few feet of us, but as the light had now faded quite away in the West it did not go up again and finally getting tired of listening we went on the dog & ended the tripman for that night. Description of notes & song. The Woodcuck rose and after flying horizontally and silently close to the ground for about twenty yds, mounts straight up in a broad spiral loop its wings whistling loudly; higher & higher at rises drifting off with the wind its wings still whistling steadily now it is fully half a hundred yards high and dumb lost to sight in the uncertain light but it has reached its