CHAPTER XVII.

bar with diamond

BIRDS AT WORK AND PLAY.

Itsounds very strange to speak of a bird at play. But you can see that birds do play, if you will give yourself the pleasure of watching them. They run along under the hedges and fences at hide-and-seek. They will stop suddenly and scold at one another for not playing "fair"; and they actually play at leap-frog, hopping over one another's backs, never once using their hands.

Sometimes they play "tag" high up in the air, especially the humming-birds and others of swift wing. You can see them playing when they are so high that they look like bumble-bees. Then perhaps they fly out of sight in the blue of the sky.

But the birds seem to do more work than play. It is as if they were saying,

"All play and no workMakes a bird a mere shirk."

Most father birds help their mates in the cradle making, whenever they can get away for a few minutes from the orchestra. But the mother has the care of everything and does the most and the finest work. We have sometimes thought the mother would do better if left all to herself, the fathers are so fussy and awkward at housekeeping.

Once, in the middle of winter, we saw a father linnet trying his best to coax his mate to build a nest on a little shelf on the upper balcony. He carried straws in his bill, and sat on the shelf, and coaxed his mate to his side, whispering to her, as if he were saying, "How nice this is," and urging her to "Go right to work." We guessed all that, you know, about their talking together, while we stood and watched them out of the window.

But the wise little mother bird just laughed provokingly and flew away. We thought she was laughing, for the father bird looked a little bit ashamed, and held his head down, though he still clung to his straw and remained for a while sitting on the little shelf. He might have known that was no time or place to build a cradle. It was midwinter, and besides the shelf was slippery.

It is common for a pair of birds to talk about housekeeping, or even to build, a long while before they need the nest. We have seen them hunting for the best spot and chatting about it, as if they were saying, "This will never do," or, "This will be just the right place when the time comes."

We have seen towhees and other birds picking up pieces of sticks and string in November, and carrying them about as if they did not know what to do with their treasures. We should think better of them if they would lay the sticks and twine away in a safe place until they are ready to use them. They seem never to think of that, but drop the things wherever they happen to be.

Birds like to pull at twine even if they have no use for it. They pick at the ends of fibrous bark, as if they valued most highly what costs them the most trouble to get.

A lady we knew was in the habit of throwing out of the window the hairs which came out of her head when she used the comb and brash in the morning. These hairs were caught in a bush, and the birds discovered them. One day her son found a bird's nest near the window, all lined with the white hairs which once grew on his dear mother's head. You may be sure the son keeps that bird's nest among his treasures.

Birds are very fond of hairs of any sort for their nest linings. We have many times placed them within their reach and sight, and they will take them up.They also use chicken feathers, if they are close at hand, and bits of soft paper.

If you want to see something that will amuse you, fasten on a tree or log a piece of old rope that has a ravelled end. Every day in nesting time the birds will tug at that ravelled end of rope, turning somersaults in their hurry, and spending more time chasing one another away from it than in actual work.

When a bird begins to build her nest, she uses coarse materials first, just as a house builder uses beams and timbers to begin with. The bird and the house builder save all the fine stuff for the last. Look closely at a nest when you find one. Pick up an old last year's nest that has blown down. This year's nests do not belong to you. See how there are, first, large sticks or weeds, or rolls of mud. Between the large sticks or weeds there are small, short ones. You can imagine that these pieces all together are nails and boards, and help to hold the whole nest together. Perhaps these may be all bound together with spiders' web or string, or even paper.

We have seen nests made of nothing but one kind of weed; usually a weed that has a strong smell, like wild sage or yarrow, is chosen. We think that the smell of these strong-scented weeds prevents lice or mites from invading the nest. Perhaps the force of habit or taste has led the bird to select this material. Probably her mother before her made the same sort of a nest, and so she thinks that is about the right thing to do.

Some birds, as the swallows, make mud houses, after the manner of the Mexicans. We often wonder if these people got their idea of house building from the birds.

Barn Swallow

Other birds use sticks and cement, as a man does brick and mortar. Some of the sea birds lay their eggs on a bare, flat rock. Even these do not roll off from the rock, for all eggs are oblong and cannot roll in a straight line. We have never seen a perfectly round egg. If you take an egg of any kind, as a hen's egg, and try to roll it down the floor or lawn, you will seewhat we mean. Then try a perfectly round ball. You will see that it is better that birds' eggs are oblong or elliptical.

Marsh Owl.

The cactus wren[16]makes her nest in the middle of a great barbed cactus in our mountain washes or desert places. The tiny Costa's humming-bird[17]builds its frail nest in the prickly elbow of the low cactus that grows in California all over the barren lowlands. This is probably for safety. A snake could hardly reach anest which was built in the middle of a cactus whose needles, or thorns, are sometimes an inch long.

[16]Heleodytes brunneicapillus.

[17]Calypte costæ.

Costa's Humming-Bird

bar with diamond

SOME OTHER BIRDS AT WORK.

Notmany of the birds in our yard are quarrelsome. They seem to respect one another's rights, especially at nesting time. It is not so much our business to tell bad or unpleasant things about birds, as to tell what ispleasant and what will make you love them. That is why we spoke a good word for the shrikes and the hawks and the owls.

If a pair of birds have selected the limb of a tree upon which to build a cradle, they are not often driven from it by other birds. It seems to us that when a sparrow has put a piece of twine over a bough, it is as if she had written her name on it or got a deed for that particular bough.

If you should wish to tame a pair of birds that are building their nest where you may watch them, wait until the nest is finished or until the first egg is laid. Sometimes it is better to wait for the little birds. A bird will desert an unfinished nest if she suspects you are watching her. But she dislikes to throw away all of her labor, and will often lay her eggs and hatch her young while you are looking at her, rather than begin her nest all over again.

If you take just one egg from the nest of some birds, leaving all of the others, the parents will never go to it again. There are other timid, delicate birds who will leave their nest if you just go up softly and peep into it. The parent birds may not be in sight, and you may think they will never know. But they have been in hiding and have seen you steal up, and they will desert the place and the nest. Only a few birds will do this, however, and these are mostly those which live far away, in a quiet dell or on a hill where people seldom go.

We feel quite sure that we can tame almost any home bird at nesting time. A goldfinch[18]has just built her nest in an apple tree near our house. We have tamed the mother bird so that we can smooth her feathers on her neck and breast with our fingers while she is sitting on the nest. At first we took leaves in our hand and touched her with them. She did not care for the leaves; they were all about her in the tree. Gradually we dropped the leaves, until she was not afraid of our hands.

[18]Spinus psaltria.

We wished to take a photograph of her, and did so one very warm day. She sat in the heat, with her wings lifted to let the air through, and her bill parted as if she were panting. The father bird comes to feed her on the nest, just as their young are fed, with his bill in hers. These finches are nurslings, you know, and are fed on prepared food.

The oriole[19]is a very interesting bird with us. She chooses to hang her hammock or cradle beneath a festoon of thick leaves on a swaying bough, or from a drooping twig. Here she prefers a broad green banana leaf or the great leaf of a fan palm. These leaves are good shelter from the sunshine.

[19]Icterus cucullatus nelsoni.

The banana leaf is about five feet long, and doubles on its midrib like a book cover during the middle of the day. At night and early in the morning, when it is cool, the leaf opens better, and it is then that the bird works at her hammock. When the pouch is finished,the leaf is kept from doubling quite up and is like a sharp roof over the heads of the young and their mother. The banana leaf is constantly waving and trembling, even when there is scarcely a bit of breeze.

Another favorite place for an oriole to build her hammock is the under side of the fan-palm leaf. You will wonder how a bird can weave a thread in and out of a leaf, when she has no fingers or needles. We have watched an oriole do this many a time, and this is how it is done. She takes a thread in her beak and pushes it through the leaf from one side. Then she flies to the other side and pushes the same thread back through another opening in the leaf which she has made with her bill. Thus she weaves a kind of cloth pouch on the under side of the leaf, flying back and forth from the upper to the under side. The pouch or hammock is lined, and there the eggs are laid. You can see the mother's head sticking out from the nest, but if she knows you are watching, she will draw her head out of sight, so you will see nothing but the nest.

The thread most used by orioles here is the fibre which ravels from the edges of the palm leaves. Where such thread is not to be had, they use twine or string of any sort.

Young orioles meet with many dangers before they leave the hammock. Sometimes their feet get tangled in the thread or horsehairs of which the nest is partly made. When the little helpless things attempt to fly out, they are sometimes caught by the toes, and therethey bang. We have rescued several which were caught this way.

It seems strange that a bird which can build so beautiful and fine a nest of threads does not know enough to pull the strings off from her baby's toes when it is caught in this way. They may do this sometimes, but we have never seen them do anything but fly about in a helpless way, chattering as orioles do.

Orioles keep no secrets to themselves. They are "tell-tales," and keep up a constant chat among themselves and at intruders. They are different in this respect from some other birds, who are as quiet as mice, never whispering a word as to where their nests are, and deceiving you, if they can, by limping away as if they were hurt. Such quiet birds will raise a nest full of birds and be off while you are wondering where they are.

We do not have chimney swifts in California; but we lived in New England once, and we recollect very well what a racket they used to make in the chimneys. Sometimes the nests fell down into the fireplace, and then what a commotion!

Some swallows choose to build under the eaves, and in caves and tunnels, and on the under side of bridges, or in crevices of rocks. We have often wondered that a bird mother can tell her own nest among so many that look just alike. We have stood and watched the barn swallows, and felt sure that they count, "One, two, three, here's my nest." How else do you supposethat a mother can be sure that she has come to the right nest?

We have seen mother birds cry and call loudly, as if for help, when the babies have fallen out of the nest. If you pick up one birdling and place it back in the nest, the mother takes a quick glance at it, and then goes on calling as before. She will not stop until she sees every one of them safe back in the cradle. This makes us think that some birds do count.

Cat-Bird.

In Tennessee, where we once lived, the cat-birds and brown thrushes used to build their nests in the porches and vines above the door. Sometimes we would takethe young birds from the nest and keep them in the parlor for company, taming and feeding them, and allowing them to flutter about on the floor to amuse strangers. Perhaps we would have them in the house for an hour.

Brown Thrush.

When we opened the door to take them home again, the old birds would be standing close by, like dogs whose masters are in the house. When they saw us, they would set up such a scolding that we felt quite ashamed for having kidnapped their children even for so short a time. They grew used to our ways before the summer was over, and would soon let us take the young without so much ado.

Small birds, such as the goldfinches and humming-birds, use a good deal of spider's web in making their cradles. This is very soft, and when many strands are used together it is very strong. This web is used to hold the mosses and plants down in place. When you see the bushes and hedges all covered with web in a damp morning, think of the little bird house-builders. Watch, in some quiet corner out of sight of them, and you will see the mother humming-bird or goldfinch dart up to the glistening webs and examine them in turn, just as a lady who is out shopping examines the different goods in a store.

Madam Bird flies down to a small web, taking a bite at it with her slender bill, as if she were feeling of it with her fingers.

Then she flies off to another spider's counter of goods and pecks at another web. When she has found what suits her, she will take several bird yards of it home with her.

In the nest of our goldfinch in the apple tree, we see some spider web binding the grasses together, but the nest itself is lined with horsehairs. We have one bay horse and one black horse. In this nest lining there are hairs from the tails of both horses, woven round with great care in a striped way, that looks as if the bird had thought about how it would look, the red and the black together.

bar with diamond

A PET HUMMING-BIRD.

Humming-birdmothers are very tender of their young and will seldom go out of sight of them. We have ourselves picked the mother from the nest and let her go, when she would immediately return to it.

If you see a humming-bird sitting on a twig napping, just clasp your hands behind you and go straight up to the bird. You can almost touch it with your face, but if you put out your hand the bird will dart away. A hummer will alight on the flowers you may be carrying, if you remain perfectly still. These birds seem to notice movement more than form.

Humming-birds, like many others, do not seem to notice a person if he is going toward them in a straight line. It is "sidewise" movement that frightens them.

We have known a humming-bird to "play 'possum," though we are told, by some one who ought to know, that it was really frightened almost to death.

This bird had come in at an open window for some flowers left on the sill. On leaving the room, by some mistake it flew up to the ceiling instead of going out at the window. The ceiling was high, so we took a long broom and chased the bird, catching it on the wisp end and bringing it down. It did not stir, though we were sure we had not hurt it. We took itin our hands, and it lay on its back with its eyes shut, as if it were indeed dead. Then we carried it to the garden, feeling very sorry. Suddenly one black eye opened, and then the other, when, in a flash, the little bird was off.

One day in spring a certain professor whom we know, who is very fond of hunting toadstools, caught sight of what he felt sure was a rare one on the limb of a live-oak tree. The heart of the professor beat with joy, for he would rather find a new kind of toadstool or lichen than a gold mine, and he put out his hand to pick this new one off. It moved, and he looked at it. It was a baby hummer, just fledged, and very delicate. It did not know enough to be afraid of him, and cuddled in his hand as if it were the nest.

He knew how much we like birds, and so the professor put the baby in his pocket basket and brought it home to us. The bird was unhurt and as free from fear as a real baby. Its face looked like a baby face, as the faces of all young birds look, innocent and sweet, and full of a helpless, not frightened, expression. You can look at the pictures and see that this is true.

To feed this bird, which seemed hungry, we mixed some sugar and water. It would not open its bill, so we held the sweet in a spoon and dipped the beak into it. It tasted, and then put out its tongue and lapped some. This very slender, thread-like tongue was long and black and very quick of movement.

Every hour we fed it with this sweetened water, andit came to know the spoon by sight and to look for it when we were coming. We moistened our lips with the syrup, and the little thing would move towards us, placing its bill on our lips and thrusting its dainty tongue all around in a way that was very amusing.

We did not know as much about humming-birds then as we have learned since, or we should have fed it as often as every fifteen minutes, and used honey in place of water.

[Transcriber Note—Do NOT feed Humming-birds honey. Honey does not have the same chemical composition as floral nectar and is more difficult for Humming-birds to digest.]

It loved to perch on the edge of a wicker basket, whose rim was so easy to cling to. It would shimmer in the sunshine like a piece of silk, no larger than "a great big bumble-bee."

In a few days it could fly all about the room, but it could not fix its toes on or around anything, and would fall helpless to the floor or drop behind the pictures.

It was cold at night, though we covered it with warm things, and often we would warm it in our hands before morning. It needed the warmth of its mother's breast.

It learned to drink cold water, and to expect it after each meal of syrup, as if it wanted to rinse its mouth. It lapped up the water like a kitten, its queer, frail tongue looking like a bit of black thread in the clear water.

We tried to get it to take tiny spiders, which we hunted in the garden, but it refused, and did not live with us very long.

We think we ought to have given it a little milk to take the place of spiders, which it must have missed.We shall never try to have another pet so frail as this; these birds seem too delicate to touch. Our fingers are not light enough. We have a friend who kept a young hummer for three months, and they are said to live even longer than this when in captivity.

Of all our bird friends, we think the humming-bird the most wonderful and interesting. This perhaps is because it is the smallest and wisest of all the birds we know.

bar with diamond

HOW WE TOOK THE HUMMING-BIRDS' PICTURES.

Thereare seventeen or eighteen kinds of humming-birds in the United States. Here in Southern California we have five of six. The largest of these is the Anna's Humming-bird.[20]It was called "Anna's Hummer" in honor of a lady of that name.

[20]Calypte annae.

This bird measures about four inches from the tip of its beak to the end of its tail. The female is a mixture of gray and green underneath, with a shining green back. The male has a throat and head of changeable bright colors, which shimmer like some metallic substance as he turns about in the sunshine.

The bill of these birds is five-eighths of an inch long, and the tongue is much longer. With this long, extensible tongue it can suck the honey from the deepest flowers. It may be seen about the petunias and the honeysuckle and the nasturtiums. There is plenty of sweet at the end of these trumpet-like flowers which the bees cannot reach with their shorter tongues.

WE LIKE SUGAR, TOO.

Page 100.

It was the Anna's Hummer which we photographed last year on purpose to put the pictures in this book, that those who do not have humming-birds nesting in their yards, or where they can study them, may see just how they look.

We have no snow storms here, but in their place are long, cold rain storms, with many days of bright, warm weather between. Flowers bloom all the time, and the humming-birds see no reason why they should not attend to their housekeeping. It is as if they thought, "Now this storm is over, we will build our cradles," never once thinking of the possibility of there coming another storm before the birdlings are out of the nest.

We were walking about in the yard one bright morning late in December, when a humming-bird poised herself above some pampas grass and stole a single tuft. This pampas grass sends up its long spikes of plumes in midsummer, and we always leave a few of them on purpose for the birds to get for their nests. They are very dusty and weather-beaten by winter, but that makes no difference, for the little separate tufts are good for crib beds.

When we saw the bird at the pampas grass, we knew that she was nesting, so we watched her. She flew to a low shrub near the path and left the tuft. Then shedarted to a cypress hedge where there were plenty of spiders' webs. She gathered a bill full of this web and returned to the shrub. In a moment she was off to the pampas grass again, and we stole up to look. Not three feet from the ground was the beginning of the smallest nest. As yet it was a mere filmy platform set where two twigs joined hands, beneath a cluster of bluish-green leaves.

The bird was shy and would not return while we were in sight, so we went away and waited, knowing that we must be very careful not to disturb her if we wished her to finish her nest.

Taming this little bird was the work of many days. At first we sat perfectly still on the door-steps, not ten feet away. She saw us even there, and would wait in the trees above for a long while before she was quite sure we would not harm her. In a day or two we could sit on the steps or move about, but not too near. Before the nest was as large as a walnut the bird allowed us to watch her a few feet away, provided we stood motionless. She was indeed a delicate creature, winding the web around and around, so that the pampas tufts should be thick and firm.

On New Year's day the first tiny oblong white egg was laid. It was a gem, the size of a navy bean, in a nest-setting of silver-gray softness. We clasped our hands in delight at this beginning of what would be living rainbow tints. In four days its mate was laid by its side. These birds always lay just two eggs.Every day the mother bird was adding more web and lichens and pampas tufts, turning about gently and rapidly to shape the nest around her.

We have never seen any birds except the hummers who add to their nests during incubation and after the young are hatched. On the twentieth day of January the first egg was hatched. We stole up to look, and there at the bottom of the small cradle was what looked like a tiny black grub, perfectly bare. We imagined the mother was very happy and thinking in her dear little heart how much the baby resembled its father.

The father, as is the custom of the males of these humming-birds, was away in the foothills sucking sweets from the mountain flowers, and leaving to his mate all the care of the household. It seems very selfish of him, but the mother bird may be very glad to be without him. What does a father humming-bird know about taking care of such tiny babies?

One day later than its mate the other egg was hatched, and there were a pair of black, bare grubs. They had no bills, except a tiny point in the middle of the mouth, which they kept open in a coaxing way. They could move nothing but their heads, and their eyes were shut tight. How carefully the mother fed them. Many a time, looking on at meal-time, we were tempted to caution the mother lest she thrust her bill a little too far down the small throats. She winked her black eye at us, while we stood with uplifted finger,as much as to say, "Don't be afraid, I have nursed babies before."

As the birdlings grew, the nest had to be enlarged, and it took every minute of the mother's time to keep the household matters in order. In a few days down began to appear upon the birds, and then a shimmering green on the backs, like that of the mother's dress. Young male hummers do not get the bright head and throat until the first moult. When the birds were thus clothed, the mother did not seem to think it necessary to build the nest up about them any higher, so the birds were crowded out gradually as they grew, until they were obliged to sit on the edge, a pair of the sweetest twins one ever saw.

A storm came down from the mountains and surprised the faithful little mother, but she sheltered the babies as best she could until we came to the rescue with a gingham apron, which we pinned in place above the nest, making a complete shelter for all. We kept this apron in place for a week, or until the storm was over. People passing by must have thought us very queer housekeepers to spread our washing in the front yard, but we did not stop to explain.

By this time the bird had grown so trustful that we could do almost anything without scaring her. We fed the young with syrup on the ends of our fingers, while the mother looked on astonished. They would put out their fine thread-like tongues and look at us from their tiny black eyes, as if thanking us. Their bills had grown out until they were quite respectable by the time the babies sat on the edge of the nest.

LEAVING THE NEST.

Page 104.

Anna's Humming-Birds.

As soon as the mother became tame enough, we took the pictures, as you see them. While we stood at the nest, she would fly all about our faces and look at our ears and eyes, and buzz at our hair in a very funny way. Once we bent the twig from its place in the shrub, and held it close to our faces, and the mother fed the young, brushing our cheeks with her gauzy wings. Then we tied it back to its old place when the mother had flown away. She came back and flew in our faces,as if she expected to find the babies there. Not finding them with us, she went back to the shrub as if nothing had happened.

It was a wonderful thing to have this shy bird so trustful and willing to have her photograph taken.

The older of the two birds left the nest first, and we had hard work to get him to be still enough for the last sitting. The mother came down and sat between the two birds on the twig, and looked at the bird who wouldn't keep still, as if she were scolding him.

She seemed just like a real person taking her baby to the artist's to have his picture taken. Once two strange old hummers came when we were taking the pictures, and bothered us a good deal. They made our mother hummer nervous and cross, and she drove them away. It seemed to us that these birds wanted to have their picture taken too, but we could not quite catch them, because they were not well enough acquainted with us and the camera.

One day the babies left the old battered nest and flew to the trees. The rim of the nest was torn and worn away by the feet of the mother as she stood to feed the young. We noticed that for a few days after they were hatched she fed them every fifteen minutes, but as they grew stronger she gave them their food only once an hour, or at even longer intervals.

MOTHER BIRD POISED ON HUMMING WINGS.

Page 106.

After they had flown, there came a hard storm, and we went out in the morning expecting to find the babies dead on the ground. But not so; there they sat in the sunshine above our heads, as safe as could be. They remained about in the yard for two or three weeks, when they disappeared, no doubt going to the foothills to join their father at sucking sweets and flitting among the vines.

bar with diamond

OUR ROBIN REDBREAST.

Almostevery child knows the robin redbreast. He is a great favorite wherever he goes. We have him with us in Southern California only in winter time for a few weeks after the rains have come. When our ground is mellow with moisture, and the angle-worms have worked their way to the top, leaving little loose hillocks all about the yard, then we look out for a visit from the robins.

They come in companies great enough to fill the tree-tops, and their constant song reminds us of old times when we lived in the New England States.

Robins are "water birds" in a way, although they do not swim. They are perfectly at home in wet grass or foliage, and even in a rain storm. They never seem to have any use for umbrellas.

Once, while on a visit to some friends in the east, we found two baby robins which were blown from their nest in a storm. We fed them with bread soaked in milk, and fresh beef, and they thrived. We shut themin an empty room upstairs, and they soon learned to look for us and to know our step. They would fly to the crack of the doorway and squeal when they heard us coming. Before we dared open the door, we had to push the birds away, for fear they would be caught and hurt.

Robin.

When we were ready to start for our California home, we put the robins in a cage, taking as much food as we thought they would need on the journey. In a day or two the meat gave out, and they grew tired of bread and water. They coaxed constantly for beef, so we asked a porter on our car to get some for them.

By this time most of the passengers had becomeinterested in our robins, and a gentleman offered to keep them in beef for the rest of the journey. He would go out once a day, when the train stopped long enough, and buy some beef. Our pets came to be quite an attraction in the car, and everybody was anxious to do something for the little travellers.

We took the birds to the dressing-room each day to clean the cage and to give them a bath. We washed them one at a time, in our hands, holding them under the gently flowing faucet. At first they objected, but they soon grew to like it.

During the first year they never sang a note, for their unmusical squeak could certainly not be called singing. The second spring we gave them a large cage in the yard, that they might make the acquaintance of other birds. In a short time an old mocking-bird came and gave them music lessons.

The teacher would twist his toes around the wires of the cage, in this way holding himself close to the birds. Then he would twitter softly, until the young birds had learned to respond and to twitter too.

When at last the robins did have a song, it was a mixture of robin and mocking-bird notes. They did not speak pure robin all that year.

After they were grown-up birds, the mocker who had taught them music took a great dislike to them. This was very strange, for he had been so fond of his little pupils, dropping berries down through the cage wires, and calling them all sorts of pet names in his ownlanguage. Now he would scold them and peck at them and scare them, until we were obliged to cover a part of the cage.

In a year or two the male robin got out of the cage and flew away. We could hear him far out of sight in the trees, but he would not come back, though we called to him in our kindest tones. He was out all night, and we supposed he was dead, as he was at the mercy of the mocking-birds.

What was our surprise early in the morning to find him on the hitching-post near the house, with his bill wide open, screaming for his breakfast. But he would not let us put our hands on him.

Then we thought of a plan to catch him, the same by which wild animals are sometimes caught. We scattered some crumbs from the post where he sat to the door of the cage, and Robin went to picking them up, of course, being very hungry and not thinking about the consequences. He followed the trail of the crumbs until, before he knew it, he was safe within the cage and the door was shut.

Once again he got away from us, but we knew he would come back at meal-time, if the shrikes and the mockers did not find him. Birds which have lived for a while in a cage seem to be perfectly helpless when out at liberty, not knowing how to find food for themselves, and dying of hunger in the midst of plenty.

Sure enough, at supper time Robin came back, clamoring for his share. There was a soft, moist place inthe garden where we were in the habit of digging worms for the robins at night. We took the cage and set it down by this place, with the door tied back.

We went to work with the spade, pretending not to notice the little runaway, who hopped close to us and screamed at his little innocent mate in the cage. We threw some worms in at the open door for the bird on the inside, who ate them, taking no notice of her companion on the outside.

Suddenly the outsider hopped to the hole where we were digging and tried to grab the worms before we had time to pick them up. But we cheated him, understanding his little game, and dodged past him with the coveted worms. He, standing on tiptoe, danced about in the funniest fashion, still trying to snatch the worms. All at once, taunting him with a good long-worm, we threw it past him into the cage. Away the bird ran after it, and the little fellow who loved so well to "play hookie" was caught once more.

bar with diamond

MORE ABOUT OUR ROBIN.

When the robins were two years old, we noticed that they were picking up straws from the bottom of the cage, and so we "took the hint." We looked all about to find something that was the shape of a nest.We were tempted at first to put a little open-work basket in the cage, but we remembered an experience which we had some years before, and did not use the basket.

The experience was this. We hung a tiny basket in the canary's cage, and the birds made a thin nest in it and hatched their eggs. The male had been very active, helping his mate in all the ways he could think of, and he thought he would mend the nest one day. So he began to peck at the string through the meshes of the basket, reaching up from the bottom. We did not think he was doing any harm, till we noticed what looked like a bird's foot hanging down through the bottom of the basket. What was our astonishment to find that the old bird had pulled off the legs of the young birds, stupidly thinking that he was tugging at the twine.

Of course we did not put a basket in the robins' cage, but we found a round butter mould, which answered just as well. The birds were very much pleased with the butter mould, and began carrying straw and mud which we gave to them, until they had quite a respectable robin's nest. We do not know whether wild robins would nest in a butter mould, if we should fasten it in the crotch of an apple tree or swing it from the branches, but it would be quite worth one's while to try, if one is living where there are wild robins.

One morning we found a blue egg in the nest. The birds were surprised. They hopped on the rim of thebutter mould and looked at the egg and chirped at it, and then the male bird hopped in and sat down on it. We clapped our hands and called to the whole family to "come and see."

But what do you think that naughty bird did? Just as we were all feeling sure of his good sense, he jumped suddenly out of the nest and then back again. Then he began to scratch with both feet as fast as he could, till the egg went out of the nest and lay in fragments on the bottom of the cage. We expected to see his mate resent it, but she took no notice, going on pecking at a peach as if nothing had happened.

"It was an accident," we said, ready to excuse our pets. The days went by, and seven blue eggs shared the fate of the first one. The birds took turns at scratching them out of the nest, as if it were great fun. We felt badly, of course, and scolded them. But they only stared helplessly at us, and did not explain the secret about those eggs.

When the robins were three years old, the male began to be sick. He had "fits" or spasms of some sort, whirling around on the floor upon his back, where he would lie as if dead for a few minutes. Then he would jump up and begin eating, as well as ever.

These attacks grew less severe, and in a few days the bird got well. His mate had taken excellent care of him, begging him to eat something right in the middle of his fit, and flying about him just like a nervous little woman. When she had nursed him back tolife and health, she was taken with the same disease and died in a short time. We asked a doctor what he thought it was, and he said he "guessed it was the grip."

The little widower did not pine away and die from grief; he was too sensible for that, and life was very pleasant to him. He took to singing with all his might as he had never sung before. For four hours in the early morning he never rested his bulging little red throat, not even to eat his breakfast. The old-fashioned robin notes, which he had made believe he never knew before, came bubbling out in a wild glee that made the neighborhood ring. People inquired all around to know where that robin was.

He was very fond of spiders, and when we took the broom in our hands he watched us closely. The large gray house spider was his favorite.

We think a good deal of these spiders, and were very sorry to give them to the robin, but we were afraid he would die if he had none. In whichever room we were when we found one of these spiders, we had only to call out, "Here's a spider, Robby," and the bird would chirp his answer, hopping to the corner of the cage nearest the door. Here he would wait for us to give him the insect. If we found a bug or a worm, we had but to call out, "Quick, Robby," and he would dart nervously from side to side of his big cage in his eagerness not to keep us waiting. He would take berries from our mouths, many a time giving our lips a tweakas if he did it on purpose. Then he would stare at us with his black eye full of fun.

A Chinaman with a vegetable cart came to our house three times a week, and Robby grew to know him and his wagon. He knew the sound of the wagon before it was in sight. He was always afraid of strangers, but this Chinaman he loved and trusted. He would hop to his cage door to meet him, and open his bill for the strawberry which "John" never forgot in berry season.

He was fond of meat of any kind, taking it salted and cooked or raw. But he would never touch bird flesh of any sort,—chicken or quail or turkey,—though we many a time ran to the cage calling, "Quick, Robby" just to surprise him. He would look disgusted and turn his head away, as if to say, "No, thank you: I am not a cannibal." He would not taste of sugar, but was fond of gingerbread and cake.

During our long dry season of many months, Robby had a way of his own to keep cool and moist. His bath was an oblong china vegetable dish, which held water enough to cover him at full length.

When the days were warm and dry, and Robin somehow missed the rain which he had never seen in summer time, he would hop into the bath and sit or lie down. The water covered him up to his ears; and there he would sit for an hour at a time, blinking and dozing, as if he were a real water bird. He would take food from our hands, too lazy and contented to stir out of the water.

When the tourist robins came in winter, we imagined our pet would remember his mate and be anxious to join the birds. But he took no notice, caring not so much for the robins as for the brown towhees who had always kept him company at the back door.

Perhaps he thought his house was small, and if all "his folk" were intending to spend the winter with him he would be crowded "out of house and home." He was not hospitable to them, nor had he "rooms to rent." He not even answered them when the tourists chirped him a last good-bye and went away in early April, after they had eaten up all the pepper berries.

Well, the longest story has an end. When our robin was in his fifth year he died, and we buried him beside our little humming-bird under the fig tree. The bees in the orange blossoms all about him sang him a dirge, and a royal mocking-bird carolled away with all his might.

Back to Index Next