But why should the poets be so
silent? Why has it not called forth such verse as the English poets have
lavished upon the nightingale? Undoubtedly because it lifts up its heavenly
voice in the solitude of the forest. whereas the nightingales, singing in loud
choruses in the moonlight under the poet's very window, cannot but impress his
waking thoughts and even his dreams with their melody.
Since the severe storm and cold in the Gulf States a few winters ago, where
vast numbers of hermit thrushes died from cold and starvation, this bird has
been very rare in haunts where it used to be abundant. The other thrushes
escaped because they spend the winter farther south.
ALICE'S THRUSH (Turdus alicia) Thrush family
Called also: GRAY-CHEEKED THRUSH; [now separated into two
species: the more mid-western GRAY-CHEEKED THRUSH and the New
England and Adirondack BICKNELL'S THRUSH, AOU 1998]
Length -- 7.5 to 8 inches. About the size of the bluebird.
Male and Female -- Upper parts uniform olive-brown. Eye-ring
whitish. Cheeks gray; sides dull grayish white. Sides of the
throat and breast pale cream-buff, speckled with arrow-shaped
points on throat and with half-round dark-brown marks below.
Range -- North America, from Labrador and Alaska to Central
America.
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