Young America in Feathers

“ How like are birds and men ! ” said Emerson, and if he had known Nature’s loveliest creatures as well as he did his own race, he might have affirmed it more emphatically; for to know birds well is to be astonished at the “ human nature they display.

In our latitude, July is distinctly the babies’ month. When wild roses give place to sun-kissed meadow lilies, when daisies drop their petals and meadowsweet whitens the pastures, when blueberries peep out from their glossy coverts and raspberries begin to redden on the hill, then from every side come the baby cries of younglings just out of the nest, and everywhere are anxious parents hurrying about, seeking food to stuff hungry little mouths, or trying to keep too venturesome young folk out of danger. For Young Americans in feathers are wonderfully like Young Americans in lawn in self-confidence and recklessness.

One evening in a certain July, up on the coast of Maine, I watched the frantic efforts of a pair of Maryland yellowthroats — tiny creatures in brown and gold — to coax their self-willed offspring to a more retired position than he chose to occupy. With genuine “ Young America ” spirit he scorned the conservatism of his elders. Though both parents hovered about him, coaxing, warning, perhaps threatening, not a feather stirred ; stolid and wide-eyed he stood, while the father flitted about the bush in great excitement, jerking his body this way and that, flirting his wings, now perking his tail up like that of a wren, again opening and closing it like a fan in the hands of an embarrassed girl, and the mother added her entreaties to his, darting hither and thither, calling most anxiously, — both, in their distress, rashly exposing themselves to what might, for all they knew, be one of the death-dealing machines we so often turn against them.

Nothing had the slightest effect upon the yellow-throated youngster until his own sensations interested him, and his parents suddenly acquired new importance in his horizon. When hunger assailed him, and, looking about for supplies, he Spied his provider on the next bush with a beak full of tempting (and wriggling) dainties, and when he found his wily parent deaf to his cries, and understood that not until he flew behind the leafy screen could he receive the food he craved, then he yielded, and joined his relieved relatives out of my sight.

Many times after that morning did the vagaries of that young yellow-throat give me opportunity to study the ways of his family. Having newly escaped from the nursery, in a thorny bush behind thick-growing alders, his strongest desire apparently was to see the world, and those outlying dead twigs, convenient for the grasp of baby feet, were particularly attractive to him. Every day for nearly a week, as I passed into the quiet old pasture, I stopped to interview the youngster, and always found him inquisitive, and evidently, in his own estimation, far wiser than his elders, who were nearly wild over his conduct.

This pasture of about forty acres, lying behind my temporary home, was the joy of my heart, being delightfully neglected and fast relapsing into the enchanting wildness of nature. In a deep bed fringed with a charming confusion of trees and bushes ran a tiny stream, which in the spring justified its right to the title of river. Scattering clumps of alders and young trees of many kinds made it a birds’ paradise, while wild cherries and berries of all sorts, with abundant insect life, offered a spread table the whole summer long.

Of flowers it was the chosen home. From the first anemone to the last goldenrod standing above the snow, there was a bewildering profusion : fragrant with roses in June, gorgeous with meadow lilies in July, and rank upon rank of budded goldenrod promising glory enough for August, with all the florid hosts that accompany them. Great patches of sweet bayberry, yielding perfume if only one’s garments swept it, and rich “cushions of juniper ” frosted over with new tips, were everywhere, and acres were carpeted with soft, gray-colored reindeer-moss, into which one’s foot sank as into the richest product of the loom. Here and there was a close grove of young pines, whose cool, dim depths were most alluring on hot days; and indeed in every spot in Maine not fully occupied Nature is sure to set a pine-tree.

Every morning, on entering this garden of delights, I hastened across an open space by the gate, and plunged into a thicket of alders sprinkled with young trees, birch, elm, and wild cherry. Through this ran a path, and in a sheltered nook under a low pine I found a seat, where for many days I spent the forenoon, making acquaintance with the pretty little yellow-throats.

From the first the head of the family adopted me as his particular charge, and I am positive he never lost sight of me for one minute. His was a charming surveillance. He did not, like the robin on similar duty, stand on some conspicuous perch like a statue of horror or dismay, uttering his loudest “ peep ! peep ! ” in warning to the whole feathered world; nor did he, after the fashion of the song sparrow, fill the air with distressed “pips” that seemed to hint of mischief dire; neither did he, as does the red squirrel, resent an intrusion into preserves that he considered his own with a maddening series of choking cries, coughs, and “ snickers,” till one was almost ready to turn a gun upon him ; still less did he, in veery style, utter wails so despairing that one felt herself a monster for remaining. The yellow’-throat’s guardianship was a pleasure. He remained in sight, not fifteen feet away from me, and did not flinch from the terrible field-glass. Sometimes he stood quite still, uttering his soft and inoffensive “chic;” again he scrambled about in the bushes, collected a mouthful, and disappeared for a moment, — a constant baby call from the bushes reminding him of his duty as provider. Evidently he had succeeded in impressing upon that obstinate offspring of his that he must keep out of sight. I wonder what sort of a bugaboo he made me out to be ?

Much of the time the tiny custodian passed away in calling and singing, throwing his head up or holding it still according as he sang loud or low. To all varieties of his pretty little melody he treated me. Never once did he utter the notes given in the books as the family song. From his beak I never heard either “wichita,” “witches here,” “ o-wee-chee,” or “ I beseech you,” all of which, excepting the last, I have heard at different times from other members of the family ; which, by the way, confirms my oft-repeated assertion that no two birds of a species sing alike. Ilis ordinary notes resembled “ pe-o-we,” delivered in lively manner, with strong accent on the first syllable. Sometimes he gave them the regulation three times; again, he added the fourth repetition, and changed this by ending on the first syllable of the fifth utterance. On one occasion he surprised and delighted me by turning from the third “pe-o-we” into a continuous little carol, varied and bewitching. Later in the season, after I had finished my studies in the alder bushes, I heard several times from a yellow-throat in the pasture a similar continuous song, usually delivered on the wing.

After some days my little watcher became so accustomed to my silent presence under the pine that he did not mind me in the least, though he never forgot me, and if I stirred he was on the alert in an instant. So long as I was motionless he ignored me entirely, and conducted himself as if he were alone ; often taking a sunning by crouching on the top twig of a bush, spreading wings and tail and fluffing out his plumage till he looked like a ragged bunch of feathers. It was very droll to see him, while in this attitude, suddenly pull himself together, Stand upright, utter his song, and instantly relapse into the spread-eagle position to go on with his sun-bath. To my surprise, I found that this warbler, whose song and movements always seem to indicate a constant flitting and scrambling about in warbler fashion, is capable of repose. He frequently stood perfectly still, the black patch which covers his eyes like an oldfashioned face-mask turned towards me, singing his little aria with as much composure as ever thrush sang his.

My pleasing acquaintance with the yellow-throat ended as soon as the young became expert on the wing and could leave their native alder patch. After that the nook was deserted, and unless I heard the song I could not distinguish my little friend among the dozens of his species who lived in the neighborhood.

Toward the north end of my delectable hunting-ground was another favorite spot, especially attractive on warm, sunny mornings. When I turned my steps that way, I came first upon the feedingground of another party of Young Americans, — thrashers. They were a family group, a pair with their two full-grown but still babyish young. Approaching cautiously, I usually found the parents on the ground busily hunting insects, and the youngsters following closely, ready to receive every morsel discovered. They were, however, very well bred, with none of the vulgar manners of those who scream and shout and demand their rations. Later in the day I often found the thrasher singing, a little beyond the alders, on the breezy heights of Raspberry Hill. His chosen place was an almost leafless birch-tree, a favorite perch with all the birds of the pasture, and there he sang for hours.

Sometimes the singing was interrupted, for those canny Young Americans knew their father’s song, and though he had doubtless stolen away and left them foraging on the grass by the path, they heard his voice and came after. While he was pouring out his soul in ecstasy, and I was listening with equal joy, those youngsters came by easy stages nearer and nearer, till one after the other alighted on the lower part of the birch, and, hopping upward from branch to branch, suddenly presented themselves before him, begging in pretty baby fashion for something to eat. The singer, embarrassed by their demands, would sometimes dive into the nearest bushes, followed instantly by the persistent beggars, and in a moment fly off, the infants still in his wake. But he always managed in some way to elude them. Perhaps he fed them or conducted them back to their mother, for in a few minutes he appeared again on the birch and resumed his music.

On one occasion I met one of these spruce young thrushes, evidently out on his travels alone for the first time. He was in a state of great excitement, — jerked himself about, “ huffed ” at me, then flew with some difficulty into a tree, where he stood and watched me in a charmingly naif and childlike manner, utterly forgetting that part of his education which bade him beware of a human being.

After passing the home of the thrashers, on my usual morning walk toward the north, my next temptation to linger came from a fern-lined path to the spring, abode of other Young Americans. The path itself was extremely seductive, narrow, zigzagging through a small forest of the greenest and freshest of ferns, so luxuriant that they were brushed aside in passing, and closed behind as if to conceal one’s footsteps. Shrubs and trees met overhead ; here and there a blooming dogbane or an elder, “foamed o’er with blossoms white as snow,” and tall wild roses wherever they could find space to grow.

Nearly down to the spring, I seated myself under the bushes and waited. At first, until the bustle of my coming was hushed, all was silent; but soon bird notes began, — soft little “ pips ” and “ chur-r-r’s,” and other sounds I could not trace to their authors, but plainly expressing disapproval of a spy among them. Catbirds complained with a soft liquid “ chuck ” or their more decided “mew;” kingbirds peeped out to see what was the excitement, and then settled in the bushes in plain sight, at leisure now since their decorous little folk were educated and taking care of themselves ; and other birds came whispering about behind my back, while I dared not turn to see, lest I send everybody off in a panic. An oriole,

dropped in as he passed, but left in haste, as if averse to company, with his customary shyness while training the young ; for this brilliant bird, during nesting so fearless everywhere, manages to disappear completely after the young leave the nest. Now and then he may be seen going about near the ground, silent, and absorbed in his arduous task of teaching those clamorous urchins to get their own living ; or in the early morning, engaged in picking open the hideous nests of the tent caterpillars and quietly taking his breakfast therefrom. Later, when bantlings are off his mind, he reappears in his favorite haunts, and sings a little before bidding us adieu for the season ; although occasionally this supplementary song is a dismal failure, and the oriole discovers, as have other singers before him, that one cannot neglect his music, even for the best of reasons, and take it up again where he left off.

As I passed under an apple-tree, one morning, on my way to the ferny path, I heard the domestic cry of the oriole, uttered, I think, only when rearing the young, a tender “yeap.” I paused instantly, and soon heard a very low baby cry, a soft “ chur-r-r ” exactly like the first note of the young oriole when he comes up to the edge o£ the nest, only subdued almost to a whisper, showing that education had progressed, and this little one had learned to control his infantile eagerness. All at once there arose a great commotion over my head ; an oriole fled precipitately to another tree and stood there watching me, scolding his harshest, flirting his wings and jerking his body in great excitement. In a moment his mate joined him, and both began to call, though she held a worm in her beak. This not seeming to effect their purpose, the singer suddenly uttered a loud, clear whistle of two notes, startlingly like a man’s whistle to a dog, when instantly a young oriole flew out of the apple-tree and joined his parents. Then the low parental note began again, and the family departed.

The infant who receives such devoted care is a pretty little creature in dull yellow, and the most persistent cry-baby I know in the bird world, though several are not far behind him in this accomplishment. His plaint begins when he mounts the edge of the nest preparatory to his début, and ceases hardly a minute for days, a long-drawn shuddering wail, that suggests nothing less than great suffering, starvation, or some other affliction hard to be borne. What makes the case still worse, the nursery is high, and each nestling chooses for himself the direction in which he will depart. East and west, north and south, they scatter; and where one lands, there he will stay for hours, if not days, drawn down into a little heap, looking lonely and miserable, and apparently impressed with the sole idea that he must keep himself before the world by his voice, or he will be lost and forgotten. It is no wonder that, between the labor of collecting food and following up the family to administer it, the mother becomes faded and draggled, and the father abandons his music, and goes about near the ground, grubbing like any ditch-digger.

The young oriole, however, does not lack intelligence. A correspondent tells me of one who, starting out too ambitiously in his first flight, landed on the ground instead of on the tree he had selected, and, looking about for a place of safety, saw a single leaf growing a few feet up on the trunk of a tree. That so inexperienced an infant should notice it was surprising, but that he should at once start for it showed remarkable “ mother wit.” To reach this haven of refuge, he ascended the tree - trunk a few inches, half flying and half climbing, clinging with his claws to the bark to rest, then scrambling upward a few inches farther, and so on till he reached the leaf, when he perched on its tiny stem, and remained there as long as he was watched.

But to return to my place among the ferns. When I had been there some time, silent and motionless, a catbird at my back, too happy to be long still, would take courage and charm me with his wonderful whisper song, an ecstatic performance which should disarm the most prejudiced of his detractors. Occasionally, his mate, as I suppose, uttered warning cries, and in deference to her feelings, as it appeared, his notes dropped lower and lower, till I could scarcely hear them, though he was not ten feet away. The song of the catbird is rarely appreciated ; probably because he seldom gives a “ stage performance,” but sings as he goes about his work. In any momentary pause a few liquid notes bubble out; on his way for food, a convenient fence-post is a temptation to stop a moment and utter a snatch of song. His manner is of itself a charm, but there is really a wonderful variety in his strains. He has not perhaps so fine an organ as his more celebrated relative, the thrasher ; he cannot, or at least he does not, usually produce so clear and ringing a tone. Nor is his method the same ; he does not so often repeat himself, but varies as he sings, so that his aria is full of surprises and unexpected turns. Doubtless, persons expert at finding imitations of other birds’ notes would discover some in his. But I am a little skeptical on the subject of conscious “ mocking.” When the catbird sings I hear only the catbird, and in the same way I take pleasure in the song of thrasher or mocking-bird, nor care whether any other may have hit upon his exact combinations.

After the catbird, silence, broken only by the soft, indescribable utterances that are at the same time the delight and the despair of the bird student. Some birds, upon entering this solitary retreat, announced themselves by a single note, or call, as effectually as if they had sent in a card, while others stole in, took quick and close observation, and departed as quietly as they had come, unseen and unheard by clumsy human senses. Often, indeed, have I wished for eyes to look behind me, where it sometimes seems that everything most interesting takes place.

This secluded corner of the pasture proved to be a very popular nursery with the feathered world. Catbirds came about bearing food, and all sorts of catbird talk went on within hearing: the soft liquid “ chuck ” and “ mew ” (so called, though it is more like “ ma-a") in all tones and inflections, complaining, admonishing, warning, and caressing. There was evidently a whole family among the bushes. A vireo baby, plainly just out of the cradle, stared at me, and addressed me with a sort of husky squawk, an indescribable sound, which, until I became familiar with it, brought me out in hot haste to see what terrible tragedy was going on. For it is really a distressful cry, although it often proclaims nothing more serious than that the young vireo wants his dinner; as some infants of the human family scream at the top of their voices under similar circumstances.

Beyond the close-growing bushes I heard the crow baby’s quavering cry ; and these seemed indeed anxious days in crowland. All the little folk were crying at once, in their loudest and most urgent tones, enough to distract the hardworking parents who hurried back and forth overhead, at their best speed, trying to stop the mouths of their ill-bred brood. On one occasion I saw an old crow flying over, calling in a decided, “ stern parent ” style, followed by a youngster not yet expert on the wing, who answered with his droll baby “ ma-a-a ” in a much higher key. She was conducting him over the pasture to the salt marsh, where much crow-baby food came from in those days, and he was doing his best to keep up with her stronger flight. Sometimes another sound from the nursery came to my ears, — the caw of an adult, drawn out into a long, earnest “ aw-w-w,” like admonishing or instructing the now silent olive branches. It was many times repeated, and occasionally interrupted by a baby voice, showing that the little ones were not asleep. I suspect, from what I have seen of crow ways, that the sable mamma is a strict disciplinarian who will tolerate no liberties and no delinquencies on the part of her dusky brood, and although this particular Young American may complain, he dare not rebel. Poor crowling ! he needs perhaps a Spartan training to fit. him for his hard life in the world. With every man’s hand against him and danger lurking on all sides, he must be wary and sharp and have all his wits about him to live.

When I could tear myself away from this domestic corner of the pasture, I passed on to the riverside nook I have mentioned. Here my seat was on the edge of the bank, high above the stream, shaded by a group of black and battered old spruces that looked as if they had faced the storms of a hundred stern Maine winters, as probably they had. Pine-trees at my back filled the air with odors ; a thicket beloved of small birds stretched away at one side. Across the river spread a sunny knoll, on which stood a huge old apple-tree, contemjmrary perhaps with the spruces, having one attractive dead branch, and surrounded at a little distance with a semicircle of shrubs and low trees. It was a tempting theatre for bird dramas, which the solitary student, half hidden on the bank above, could overlook and bring to clear vision with a glass, while not herself conspicuous enough to startle the actors. In this lovely spot many mornings of that happy July passed delightfully away.

In the leafy background to the appletree dwelt the veery. From its apparently impenetrable depths came his warning calls, and on rare and blessed occasions his heavenly song ; for it was July, and it is only in June that

For, with all the rhapsody in his soul, this thrush is a devoted parent, and notwithstanding the fact that he is one of the kings of song, he comes down like the humblest sparrow of the fields to help feed and train his lovely tawny brood. Without exception that I know, he is the most utterly heartbroken of birds when the nest is discovered. So pathetic are the wails of both parents that I never could bear to study a nest, and I had to harden my heart against the bleating, despairing cries of the mother before I could secure even a look at a youngster just out of the nest. This scion of the charming thrush family is a patient little soul, with all the dignity and reserve, as well as the gentleness, of his race; no human child could be more winning.

In this corner, one morning, I saw a catbird gathering blueberries for dinner. She came down on a fence-post as light as a feather, looked over to where I sat motionless under my tree, hesitated, flirted her tail expressively as who should say, “ Can I trust her ? ” then glanced down to the berry-loaded bushes on the ground, and turned again her soft dark eyes on me. I hardly breathed, and she flew lightly to the first wire of the fence, paused, then to the second, still keeping an eye my way. At that point she bent an earnest gaze on the blueberry patch, turning this way and that, and I believe selecting the very berry she desired ; for she suddenly dropped like a shot, seized the berry, and was back on the post, as if the ground were hot. There she rested long enough for me to see what she held in her beak, and then disappeared in the silent way she had come. In a moment she returned ; for it was not for herself she was berrying, but for some speckled-breasted beauty shyly hiding in the alder thicket below.

As the babies’ month drew near its close, and August stood threateningly on the threshold, sometimes I heard young folk at their lessons. Most charming was a scion of the chewink family learning to ring his silver bell. I could not see him, — he was hidden behind the leafy screen across the river ; but happily sounds are not so easily concealed as sights, and the little performance explained itself as clearly as if I had had the added testimony of my eyes (though I longed to see it, too). The instructor was a superior singer, such as I have heard but few times, and the song at its best is one of our most choice, consisting of two short notes followed by a tremolo perhaps an octave higher, in a loud clear ring like a silver-toned bell.

For several minutes this rich and inspiring song rang out from the hushes, to my great delight, when suddenly it ceased, and a weak voice piped up. It was neither so loud nor so clear; the introductory notes were given with uncertainty and hesitation, and the tremolo was a slow and very poor imitation. Still it was plain that the towhee baby was practicing for his entrance into the ranks of our most bewitching singers. The next day, a chewink, I think the same whose music and whose teaching I had admired, honored me with a song and a sight together. He was as spruce as if he had just donned a new suit, his black hood like velvet, his chestnut of the richest and his white of the whitest, and he sang from the top of a small pine-tree; sometimes, in the restless way of his family, scrambling over the branches, and again shifting his position to a small birch-tree.

Many other songs and singers I enjoyed in those pleasant mornings beside the river, till the hour for what Thoreau designates as that whirlpool called a dinner ” drew near, and then, unmindful of the philosopher’s advice, I started slowly homeward, collecting as I went materials to fill the vases in my room.

The bird-baby world was not bounded by any pasture, however enchanting, and I have not told all the charms of this one. The house where I found bed and board, in the intervals of bird study, — once a farmhouse, now an “ inn of rest ” for a country - loving family, — was happily possessed of two attractions : the pasture toward which I turned with the morning sun, and a meadow which drew me when shadows grew long in the afternoon. This meadow began at the road passing in front of the house, and extended to the salt marsh which separated us from the sea. The marsh was always a beautiful picture,

It was never twice the same, for it changed with every passing cloud, with every phase of the weather, with every tide ; one never tired of it. And it was full of winged life: not only the beautiful gulls,

in a white cloud over the far-off beach, but small birds of several kinds, who never came near enough to dry land to be identified. Sharp-tailed sparrows appeared on the meadow after grass was cut, and their exquisite ringing trill could always be heard from the bank; crows fed upon it every day ; blackbirds’ wings were always over it; and above all, sandpipers were there,

At the edge of the meadow, where it sloped sharply down to the marsh, lived one whose days were full of trouble, which he took care to make known to the world, — a

His little family, not yet out of the nest, was settled safely enough behind a clump of bushes that fringed the marsh. But he, in his rôle of protector, had taken possession of two trees on the high land, where he could overlook the whole neighborhood, and see all the dangers, real and fancied, that might, could, would, or should threaten them, and “ borrow trouble ’’ to his heart’s content. The trees, this bird’s headquarters, were an aged and half-dead cherry and a scraggy and wind-battered elm, standing perhaps a hundred feet apart. On the top twig of one of these, or flying across between them, he was most of the time to be seen, and his various cries of distress, as well as his wild, woodsy song, came plainly up to me in my window.

The troubles of this Martha-like character began when mowers brought their clattering machine, and with rasping noise and confusion dire laid low the grass which had isolated him from the rest of the world, and that impertinent world poured in. First came crows, from their homes in the woods beyond the pasture, to feast on the numerous hoppers and crawlers left roofless by the mowers, and to procure food for their hungry young, and alighted in the stubble, two or three or half a dozen at a time. By this the soul of the redwing was fired, and with savage war-cries he descended upon them. His manner was to fly laboriously to a great height, and then swoop down at a crow as if to annihilate him. The bird on the ground turned from his insect hunt long enough to snap at his threatening enemy, and then returned to his serious business. So long as the crows stayed the redwing was frantic, his cries filled the air ; and as they were almost constantly there, he was kept on the borders of frenzy most of the time.

After the crows came the bird students, with opera - glasses and spying ways. These also the irascible redwing decided to be foes, flying about their heads threateningly, and never ceasing his doleful cries so long as they were in sight. I hoped his brown-streaked mate down in the marsh knew what a fussy and suspicious personage she had married, and would not be made anxious by his extravagances ; but she too distrusted the bird gazers, adding her protests to his, and such an out pouring of “ chacks ” and other blackbird maledictions one — happily — is not often called upon to encounter.

After the bird students the haymakers ; and every time a man or a horse appeared in that field, the blackbird was thrown into utter despair, and the air rang with his lamentations.

He was evidently a character, a bird of individuality, and I was anxious to know him better; so, although I hated to grieve him, I resolved to go somewhat nearer, hoping that he would appreciate my harmlessness and soon see that he had nothing to fear from me. Not he ! Having taken it into his obstinate little head that all who approached the sacred spot he guarded were on mischief bent, he refused to discriminate. The moment I approached the gate, the whole width of the meadow from him, he greeted me with shouts and cries, and did not cease for an instant, though I stayed two hours or more. I always went as modestly and inoffensively as possible through the meadow, far from his two trees, seated myself on the edge of the slope at some distance from him, and remained quiet. But he was never reconciled. His first act, as I started down the field, was to fly out to meet me, as if to drive me away. When he reached me, he would hold himself ten or fifteen feet above my head, perfectly motionless excepting a slight movement of the wings, looking as if he meditated an attack ; and indeed I did sometimes fear that he would treat me as he did the crows. As I came nearer, his mate flew up out of the bushes, and added her demonstrations to his. Their movements in the air were beautiful. One would beat himself up quite high, and then hover, or apparently rest at that altitude, as if too light to come down, at last floating earthward, pausing now and then, as if he absolutely could not return to our level.

Occasionally my presence caused a domestic scene not easy to interpret. Madam, no doubt fully aware of the prying ways of the human family, sometimes hesitated to return to her little ones in the bushes. She flew around uneasily, alighting here and there, anxious and worried, but plainly afraid of exposing her precious secret. Then her “ lord and master ” took her in hand, flying at her, and following wherever she fled before him, till he almost overtook her, when she dropped into the marsh, and with a low, satisfied chuckle he took a wide circle around and returned to his tree. Scolding all the time, she remained Some minutes in the deep grass, then flew up high, and floated down to the alder clump where the nest was placed. Upon this, her observant lord, whose sharp eyes nothing escaped, instantly flew down again, dashed impetuously through the alders, and without pausing returned to his post. Now how should one interpret that little family interlude ?

Later, when the young were out of the nest and quite expert on wing, the redwing’s relations with them puzzled me, also. I often saw the two who appeared to compose the family flying about with their mother, and I knew they were his because he frequently joined the party. But their conduct seemed unnatural, and a doubt stole over me whether this bird — this individual, I mean — could be a domestic tyrant. I knew from previous studies that the love-making manners of the redwing are a little on the “ knock-downand-drag-out ” order of some savage tribes of our own species. To chase the beloved until she drops with fatigue seems to be the blackbird idea of a tender attention, and possibly the pursuit of his spouse already spoken of may have been of this sort, merely a loverly demonstration. But with the babies it was a different thing. Heretofore I had seen blackbird fathers devoted attendants on their young, working as hard as the mothers in seeking supplies, and following up the wandering brood to administer them. But this bird, I observed, was avoided by the little folk. When he showed inclination to join the family party on one of its excursions, they sided away from him, and if he came too near they uttered a sort of husky “ huff,” like the familiar protest of a cat. With the same sound they greeted him and moved away when he approached a bush where they sat. Perhaps this crustiness of demeanor was the natural result of his long weeks of anxiety and trouble as protector during their helpless infancy ; perhaps he was tired out and exhausted, and it was not irritability, but nervous prostration that made him appear so unamiable. indeed, I do not see how it could be otherwise, after his exciting life. And may that not explain the fact that when the young are grown, the singer shakes off all family ties and joins a flock of his comrades, while mother and young remain together ? Since he insists on taking his family responsibilities so hard, he cannot be blamed for desiring a rest for part of the year.

Now that the nest was deserted and the young were always going about with their mother, I wondered that the head of the family did not relax his vigilance over the meadow and abandon his two watch-towers ; but save that his enticing song came up to me oftener than his cries of distress, his habits were not materially altered. One day, when I thought his summer troubles ought surely to be over, a fresh anxiety came to him. Several women and girls, with a dog, appeared on the marsh, which at low tide was in some parts explorable. The human members of the party amused themselves with bathing and wading in the now shallow stream ; but the dog acted like one gone mad, dashing about on those peaceful flats where so many birds were enjoying themselves quietly, rushing full gallop from one group to another, wading or swimming the winding stream every time he came to it, and barking at the top of his voice every instant. Birds rose before him in flocks, sandpipers took to their wings in panic, swallows swooped down over him in anxious clouds, sharptailed sparrows and all other winged creatures fled wildly before this "agitator” who seemed to have no aim except to disturb, and reminded me irresistibly of his human prototype. Somewhere in that “ league upon league of marsh grass,” I suppose, were the blackbird’s little folk ; for the watcher on the bank was in deepest tribulation, and his outcries quickly brought me down to see what had happened.

The Young Americans of the redwing family are as vivacious and uneasy as might be expected of the scions of that house. No sooner do they get the use of their sturdy legs than they scramble out of the nest and start upon their bustling pilgrimage through life, first climbing over the bushes in their neighborhood, and as they learn the use of their wings becoming more venturesome, till at last, every time a hard-working mother brings a morsel of food, she has to hunt np her straggling offspring before she can dispose of it. Though eager for food as most youngsters, they are altogether too busy investigating this new and interesting world to stay two minutes in one place. So far from waiting, like Mr. Micawber, for something to turn up, they proceed, the moment they can use their limbs, to attack the problem of delay for themselves ; to wait is not a blackbird possibility. It is needless to say that such prefer naturally sharp and wide-awake Young Americans very soon graduate from the nursery.

The last trial that came to the blackbird, and the one, perhaps, that induced him finally to abandon his watch-towers and join his friends on the bank farther down, was the appearance one day in the meadow of a new importation from the city, a boy marked out for notice by a striking yellow - and - black cap. The instant he entered the inclosure afar off the redwing uttered a shriek of hopeless despair, as who should say, “ What horrible yellow-headed monster have we here ? ” and as long as he remained the bird cried and bewailed his fate and that of his family, as if murder and sudden death were the sure fate of them all. It was the last act in the blackbird drama on the meadow.

Olive Thorne Miller.