Chapter 3

GREETINGS



AS fast as they could fly, old Mr. Crow and Mr. Red-winged Blackbird hurried over to the meadow, where they had heard Bobby Bobolink's bubbling notes.

They found him enjoying himself with a lively company of careless bachelors--all distant cousins of Bobby Bobolink--who had travelled with him in a roistering flock all the way from the South.

They were all wonderful singers--those happy Bobolinks. They could scarcely have kept still if they had wanted to. But somehow Bobby Bobolink seemed to be just a bit the best singer of the lot.

Perched on a fence-post, Mr. Meadowlark was drinking in Bobby's merry songs. Jolly Robin had stolen away from the orchard to greet the newcomer and listen to his first concert. And even Rusty Wren had forsaken the cherry tree beside the farmhouse. Although Rusty and his wife were in the midst of putting their summer house to rights, he had not been able to resist telling Mrs. Wren, who did not like to have him away from home, that he must make a short visit in the meadow, "to see a friend."

Mr. Red-winged Blackbird called "Conk-err-ee!" several times to Bobby Bobolink, meaning that he was glad Bobby was back in Pleasant Valley and that he hoped he was in good health, and that Bobby certainly hadn't forgotten how to sing.

As for old Mr. Crow, he winked at Bobby Bobolink and said in a hoarse voice, "I hear they're planting rice down South."

Bobby Bobolink was not like Mr. Crow, who would have flown into a rage had any one made such a remark to him.

"I stayed a while in the rice fields," he answered. "And if I hadn't come away when I did," he added with a laugh, "I'd have been too fat to fly way up here to Pleasant Valley."

Then a torrent of notes came tumbling out of his throat as he darted right over the head of old Mr. Crow (who stood on a hillock) and swerved and zigzagged and wheeled through the air, until Mr. Crow almost tied his neck into a knot, just watching him.

"By the way," Mr. Meadowlark said in an undertone to Mr. Red-winged Blackbird, "our friend Bobby has a different suit from the one he wore when I last saw him."

"When was that?" Mr. Red-winged Blackbird inquired.

"About the middle of last summer!" Mr. Meadowlark explained.

"Ah! This is the second suit he has had since then," said Mr. Red-winged Blackbird. "If you had been with us in the swamp last fall you'd have known that Bobby had a new one then. And here he is now with still another."

Mr. Meadowlark looked a bit troubled.

"I liked the black one--the black one with the white and buff trimmings," he remarked. "It was very becoming to Bobby Bobolink. I was hoping he'd wear one like it this summer."