One after another, sweeping in wider
circles, come forth these birds of prey, till the whole air seems alive
with them; darting hither and thither, and uttering wild, shrill screams,
as they rise higher and higher in the upper air, till some are almost lost
to sight. Sometimes one of them will descend with a sudden swoop to the
lower regions of the air, just above the highest treetops, with a hollow,
booming sound, as if some one were blowing in an empty vessel.
At this hour, too, the bats would quit their homes in hollow trees and old
rocky banks, and flit noiselessly abroad over the surface of the quiet,
star-lit lake: and now also would begin the shrill, trilling note of the
green-frog, and the deep, hoarse bass of the bull-frog, which ceases only
at intervals, through the long, warm summer night. You might fancy a droll
sort of dialogue was being carried on among them. At first a great fellow,
the patriarch of the swamp, will put up his head, which looks very much
like a small pair of bellows, with yellow leather sides, and say, in a
harsh, guttural tone, "Go to bed, go to bed, go to bed." After a moment's
pause, two or three will rise and reply, "No, I won't; no, I won't; no, I
won't." Then the old fellow, with a growl, replies, "Get out, get out, get
out.
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