comes the most attractive time of year to the bird-lover,—the baby-days, when the labors and anxieties of the nest being over, proud and happy parents bring forward their tender younglings all unused to the ways of the world, and carry on their training before our eyes.

First to come upon the scene of the summer's studies was the brown thrush family. For some time the head of the household had made the grove a regular resting place in his daily round. He always entered in silence, alighted on the lowest limb of a tree, and hopped lightly, step by step, to the top, where he sang softly a few delightful and tantalizing strains. In a moment he dropped to the ground, uttering a liquid note or two as he went, and threw into his work of digging among the dead leaves the same suppressed vehemence he had put into his song. Not unfrequently he came into collision with a sparrow mob that claimed to own that piece of wood, and his way of dealing with them was an ever fresh satisfaction. He stood quiet, though the crouching attitude and the significant twitches of his expressive tail indicated very clearly to one who knew him that he was far from calm inside; that he was merely biding his time. His tranquil manner misled the vulgar foe; that they mistook it for cowardice was obvious. Nearer, and still nearer, they drew, surrounded him, and seemed about to fall upon him in a body, when he suddenly wheeled, and like a flash of light dashed right and left almost simultaneously, as if he had become two birds, and the impertinent enemy fairly vanished before him.

Like many another bird, however, the thrasher, although not afraid of sparrows, disliked a continual row. He had gradually ceased to come into the neighborhood, and I feared I should neither see nor (what was worse) hear him again. But one morning he presented himself with two youngsters, so brimful of joy that he quite forgot his previous caution and reserve. They perched in plain sight on the fence, and while the little ones clumsily struggled to maintain their footing, the father turned his head this side and that, jerked his tail, and uttered a low cry as touch as to say, "Can anybody beat that pair now?"

In a moment he fell to the serious work of filling their hungry mouths. Being very wide awake, the young birds readily saw where supplies came from, and then they accompanied their parent to the ground, following every step, as he dug almost without ceasing. After a tolerably solid repast of large white grubs, he slipped away from the dear coaxers, disappeared on the other side of the fence, and before they recovered from their bewilderment at finding themselves deserted, returned bearing in his beak a strawberry. The young thrush received the dainty eagerly, but finding it too big to swallow, beat it on the fence as if it were a worm. Of course it parted, and a piece fell to the ground, which the waiting parent went after, and administered as a second mouthful.

For a long time the little ones were fed on the fence, and the father was so happy that every few minutes he was forced to retire behind a neighboring tree and "make gladness musical upon the other side."

After that morning the thrasher came daily to the place, and a dessert of strawberries invariably followed the more substantial meal, but never again did he bring more than one of his family with him.

One morning the brown thrush baby, who had been rapidly growing self-reliant, came alone for the first time. It was interesting to watch him, running along the tops of the pickets; searching in the hot grass till out of breath for something to eat; looking around in a surprised way, as if wondering why the food did not come; making a dash, with childlike innocence, after a strawberry he saw in the mouth of a robin, who in amazement leaped a foot in the air; and at last flying to a tree to call and listen for his sire. That wise personage, meanwhile, had stolen silently into the grove, all dripping from his bath in the bay, and while indulging in a most elaborate dressing and pluming, had kept one eye on the infant in the grass below, apparently to see how he got on by himself. When at last the little one stood panting and discouraged, he called, a single "chirp." The relieved youngster recognized it and answered, and at once flew over to join him.

This restless young thrasher, excepting that he was perhaps somewhat lighter in color and a little less glossy of coat, looked at that moment as old as he ever would. Nothing but his ingenuous ways, and his soft baby-cry "chr-er-er" revealed his tender age. His curiosity when he found himself in an unfamiliar place or on a strange tree was amusing. He looked up and down, stretching his neck in his desire to see everything; he critically examined the tuft of leaves near him; he peered over and under a neighboring branch, and then gazed gravely around on the prospect before him. He flew with ease, and alighted with the grace of his family, on the bare trunk of a tree, the straight side of a picket, or any other unlikely place for a bird to be found. For a week he came and went and was watched and studied, but one day the strawberries were gathered in the old garden, and the beautiful brown thrush baby appeared no more.

The world was not deserted of bird voices, however.

For days the wood had resounded with the shrill little cries of swallow babies, who alighted on the low trees on the border while their busy parents skimmed over the bay, or the marshy shore, and every few minutes brought food to their clamorous offspring. I had a remarkably good opportunity to make the acquaintance of this youngster—the white-bellied swallow. There were dozens of them, and the half grown trees were their chosen perches. The droll little fellows, with white fluffy breasts, no feet to speak of, and

did not even notice me in my nook under the pines.

They could fly very well, and now and then one followed the parent far out, calling sharply his baby "cheep" and trying to get close to her in the air. Often she turned, met and fed him on the wing, and then sailed on, while the youngster lagged a little, unable to give his mind to feeding and flying at the same time. Sometimes the mother avoided a too persistent pleader by suddenly rising above him. When a little one was at rest, she usually paused before him on wing only long enough to poke a mouthful into his wide open beak; occasionally—but not often—she alighted beside him for a few moments.

Leading out into the water for the use of boatmen, was a narrow foot pier, provided on one side with a hand rail. This rail was a convenient rendezvous for all the babies belonging to the swallow flock, a sort of a community nursery. On this they rested from the fatigue of flying; here they were fed, and sometimes gently pushed off the perch afterward, as a mild hint to use their wings.

I wanted to find out whether parents and young knew each other from all the rest. Of course in this crowd it was not possible to tell, but I found a better chance in another favorite spot, an old post that rose out of the water, eight or ten feet from the shore, and so small that it was only comfortable for one, although two could stand on it. The post seldom lacked its occupant, a baby swallow with head up, looking eagerly into the flock above him. This isolated youngling I made my special study. Sometimes on the approach of a grown up bird, he lifted his wings and opened his mouth, petitioning for, and plainly expecting food. At other times he paid not the least attention to a swallow passing over him, but sat composed and silent, though watchful, apparently for the right one to come in sight. He was often, though not invariably, fed upon his appeal; but that proves nothing, for it would require the services of a dozen parents to respond to every request of a young bird. It not unfrequently happened, too, that one of the flock always flying about over the water came very near the little one on the post as if to offer him a morsel, but suddenly, when almost upon him, wheeled and left,—obviously mistaken. On no such occasion did that knowing youngster show any expectation of attention. Again there would sometimes join him on the post, a second young swallow, and, although crowded, they were quite contented together. Then I noticed as the elders swept over, that sometimes one baby begged, sometimes the other; never both at once. This seemed to indicate that the little one knows its parents, for no one familiar with the craving hunger and the constant opening of the baby beak to its natural purveyors, will doubt that when a young bird failed to ask, it was because the elder was not its parent.

An early lesson in many bird lives is that of following, or flying in a flock, for at first the babies of a brood scatter wildly, and seem not to have the smallest notion of keeping together. The small swallows in the trees near me were carefully trained in this. Often while one stood chirping vehemently, clearly thinking himself half starved, a grown-up bird flew close past him, calling in very sweet tones, and stopped in plain sight, ten or fifteen feet away. Of course the youngster followed at once. But just as he reached the side of the parent, that thoughtful tutor took another short flight, calling and coaxing as before. This little performance was repeated three or four times before the pupil received the tidbits he so urgently desired.

Other sweet baby-talk in the trees came from the wood-pewee. The pewee I had noted from the building of her beautiful lichen-covered cradle in the crotch of a wild-cherry tree. The branch, dead and leafless, afforded no screen for the brave little mother. Look when one might, in the hottest sunshine or the heaviest rain, there sat the bird quite up out of the nest, head erect and eyes eagerly watching for intruders. The pewee, for all his tender and melancholy utterances, has a fiery spirit. He hesitates not to clinch with a brother pewee, interpolates his sweetest call into the hot chases, and even when resting between encounters, spreads his tail, flutters his wings, and erects his crest in a most warlike manner. The little dame was not a whit less vigilant than her spouse. Let but a blackbird pass over and she was off in a twinkling, pursuing him, pouncing down upon him savagely, and all the time uttering her plaintive "pe-o-wee!" till her mate joined her, and made it so uncomfortable for the big foe that he departed, protesting to be sure in vigorous black-birdese, but taking good care to go. So persistent were the pewees in these efforts, that in a few days they convinced a pair of blackbirds (purple crow blackbirds) that this part of the grove was no longer a thoroughfare, and whereas they had been quite frequent visitors, they were now rarely seen.

The saucy robin who chose to insist upon his right to alight on their tree, as he had always done, was harder to convince; in fact, he never was driven away. Every day, and many times a day, arose the doleful cry of distress. I always looked over from my seat on the other side of the little open spot in the wood, and invariably saw a robin on the lower part of the wild-cherry where the trunk divided, flirting his tail, jerking his wings, and looking very wicked indeed. Down upon him came one, sometimes two pewees. He simply ran up the sloping branch toward their nest, hopped to another limb, every step bringing him nearer, the pewees darting frantically at him—and at last took flight from the other side; but not until he was quite ready. This drama was enacted with clock-like regularity, neither party seeming to tire of its repetition, till the happy day when the pewee baby could fly, and appeared across the grove, near me.

One morning I noticed the anxious parents very busy on a small oak-tree, but a clump of leaves made a perfect hiding place for the infant, and I could not see it at first. There may have been more, although I saw but one and heard but one baby cry, a prolonged but very low sound of pewee quality. While their charge lingered so near me, I was treated to another sensation by one of the pair,—a pewee song. The performer alighted almost directly over my head, and began at once to sing in a very sweet voice, but so low it could not be heard a dozen feet away. There was little variation in the tones, but it was rapidly delivered, with longer and shorter intervals and varying inflections, a genuine whisper-song such as most birds that I have studied delight in. It did not please madam, his mate; she listened, looked, and then rushed at the singer, and I regret to say, they fell into a "scrimmage" in the grass, quite after the vulgar manner of the sparrow.

They soon returned to their duty of feeding the baby behind the oak leaf screen. Both came very nearly at the same time; each one on arriving, administered a significant "poke" behind the leaf, then indulged in several eccentric movements in their jerky style, dashed after a fly, stood a full minute staring at me, and at last flew. This programme was scarcely varied. Inoffensive as I was, however, the birds plainly did not relish my spying upon them, and when I returned from luncheon, they had removed their infant. For a day or two, I heard on the farther side of the grove the sweet, mournful "pe-o-wee" with which this bird proclaims the passage of another insect to its fate, and then it was gone, and I saw and heard them no more.

One morning I rose at dawn and seated myself behind my blind to spy upon the doings of the early risers. On this particular morning I first heard the tender notes of "the darling of children and bards"—the bluebird baby. The cry was almost constant; it was urgent and clamorous beyond anything I ever heard from "April's bird." I even doubted the author till I saw him. The thin and worn looking mother who had him in charge worked without ceasing, while the open-mouthed infant lifted up his voice and wept in a way so petulant and persistent as to completely disguise its sweet bluebird quality. Now this charming youngster, bearing heaven's color on his wings, with speckled bib and shoulder-cape, and honest, innocent eyes, is a special favorite with me; I never before saw a cry-baby in the family, and I did not lose sight of him. Three or four days passed in which the pair frequently came about, but without the father or any other young ones. Had there been an accident and were these the survivors? Was the troublesome brawler a spoiled "only child"? All questions were settled by the appearance somewhat later of three other young bluebirds who were not cry-babies. The father had evidently shaken off the trammels of domestic life, and "gone for his holiday" into the grove, where his encounters with the pewees kept up a little excitement for him.

When the pitiful looking little dame had succeeded in shaking off her ne'er-do-well, the four little ones came every day on the lawn together. Sometimes the mother came near to see how they prospered, but oftener they were alone. They cried no more; they ran about in the grass, and if one happened upon a fat morsel, the three others crowded around him and asked in pretty baby fashion for a share. Often they went to the fence, or the lower bar of the grape trellis, and there stood pertly erect, with head leaning a little forward, as though pondering some of the serious problems of bluebird life, but in fact concerning themselves only with the movements in the grass, as now and then a sudden plunge proved. Sometimes one of the group appeared alone on the ground, when no person was about (except behind the blinds), and then he talked with himself for company, a very charming monologue in the inimitable bluebird tone, with modifications suggesting that a new and wonderful song was possible to him. He was evidently too full of joy to keep still.

The English sparrow, who had usurped the martin house in the yard, warned him off; the tiny golden warbler, who flitted about the shrubbery all day, threatened to annihilate him, but with infantile innocence he refused to understand hostility; he stared at his assailant, and he held his ground. The little flock of four was captivating to see, and though the mother looked ragged and careless in dress, one could but honor the little creature who had made the world so delightful a gift as four beautiful new bluebirds, in whose calm eyes

Other young birds were plentiful in those warm July days. From morning till night the chipping sparrow baby, with fine streaked breast, uttered his shrill cricket-like trill. No doubt he had already found out that he would get nothing in this world without asking, so, in order that nothing escape him, his demand was constant. The first broods of English sparrows had long before united in a mob, and established themselves in the grove, and the nests were a second time full of gaping infants calling ever for more. The energies of even this unattractive bird were so severely taxed that he spared us his comments on things in general, and our affairs in particular. In the wood, young high-holes thrust their heads out of the door and called; blackbird and martin babies flew over with their parents, talking eagerly all the way; barn swallow nestlings crowded up to the window-sill to look out and be fed by passing mothers; and cautious young kingbirds, in black caps, dressed their feathers on the edge of the nest.

But days hurried on; before long, young birds were as big as their fathers and had joined the ranks of the grown-ups. There were no more babies left on tree or lawn, and holiday time was over.

VI.

The birds were already there. The robin came on to the rail fence, and with rain pouring off his sleek coat, bade us "Be cheery! be cheery!" the bluebird sat silent and motionless on a fence post; the "veery's clarion" rang out all the evening from the valley below; many little birds sang and called; and

But the bluejays?

The bluejays, too, were there. One saucily flirted his tail at me from the top of a tree; another sly rogue flaunted his blue robes over a wall and disappeared the other side; a third shrieked in my face and slipped away behind a tree; but one and all were far too wise to reveal their domestic secrets. I knew mysteries were on foot among them, as we know little folk are in mischief by their unnatural stillness, but I knew also that not until every jay baby was out of the nest, and there was nothing to hide, should I see that cunning bird in his usual noisy, careless rôle.

The peculiarity of that particular corner of nature's handiwork was that any way you went you had to climb, except east, where you might roll if you chose; in fact, you could hardly do otherwise. The first day of my hunt I started west. I climbed a hill devoted to pasture, passed through the bars, and faced my mountain. It presented a compact front of spruce-trees closely interlaced at the ground, and of course impassable. But a way opened in the midst, the path of a mountain brook, deserted now and dry. I sought an alpenstock. I abandoned all impedimenta. I started up that stony path escorted on each side by a close rank of spruce. It was exceedingly steep, for the way of a brook on this mountain-side is a constant succession of falls. I scrambled over rocks; I stumbled on rolling stones; I "caught" on twigs and dead branches; I crept under fallen tree trunks; the way grew darker and more winding. How merrily had the water rushed down this path, so hard to go up! How easy for it to do so again! Nothing seemed so natural. I began to look and listen for it.

A mysterious reluctance to penetrating the heart of the mountain by this unknown and strangely hewn path stole over me. I felt like an intruder. Who could tell what the next turn might reveal? On a fallen trunk that barred my way I seated myself to rest. The silence was oppressive; not a bird called, not a squirrel chattered, not an insect hummed. The whole forest was one vast, deep, overwhelming solitude. I felt my slightest rustle an impertinence; I could not utter a sound; surely the spirit of the wood was near! A strange excitement, almost amounting to terror, possessed me. I turned and fled—that is to say, crept—down my steep and winding stair, back to the bars where I had taken leave of civilization (in the shape of one farmhouse).

Here I paused, and again the legend of bluejays allured me. From the bars, turning sharply to one side, were the tracks of cows. The strange feeling of oppression vanished. Wherever the gentle beasts had passed, I could go, sure of finding sunny openings, grassy spots, and nothing uncanny. Meekly I followed in their footsteps; the solemn grandeur of the forest had so stirred me that even the footprint of a cow was companionable.

This path led down through a pleasant fringe of beech and birch and maple trees to a beautiful brook, which was easily crossed on stones, then up the bank on the other side into an open pasture with scattering spruce and other trees. Now I began to look for my bluejays. I disturbed the peace of a robin, who scolded me roundly from the top spire of a spruce. I started out in hot haste a dainty bit of bird life—the black and yellow warbler. I listened to the delightsome song of the field-sparrow. I heard the far-off drumming of the partridge. I walked and climbed myself tired.

Then I sat down to wait. I made a nosegay of blue violets and sweetbrier leaves; I regaled myself with wintergreens in memory of my childhood; I wrote up my note-book; but never a blue feather did I see.

The next day, between showers, I tried the north, with a guide—a visiting Massachusetts ornithologist—to show me a partridge nest with the bird sitting. We followed the ups and downs of the road for a mile, passing a meadow full of bobolinks,

climbed by a grass-grown wood road a mountain-side pasture, and reached the forest. Under a dead spruce sat my lady, in a snug bed among the fallen leaves. She was wet; her lovely mottled plumage was disarranged and draggled, but her head was drawn down into her feathers in patient endurance, the mother love triumphant over everything, even fear. We stood within six feet of the shy creature; we discussed her courage in the face of the human monsters we felt ourselves to be. Not a feather fluttered, not an eyelid quivered; truly it was the perfect love that casteth out fear.

My guide went on up to the top of Greylock; I turned back to pursue my search.

Eastward was my next trip, down toward the brook that made a valley between Greylock and Ragged Mountain. My path was under the edge of the woods that fringed a mountain stream. Not the smallest of the debt we owe the bonny brook is that it wears a deep gully, whose precipitous sides are clothed with a thick growth of waving trees—beech, white and black birches, maple, and chestnut—in refreshing and delightful confusion. The stream babbled and murmured at my side as I walked slowly down, peering in every bush for nests, and at last I parted the branches like a curtain and stepped within. It was a cool green solitude, a shrine, one of nature's most enchanting nooks, sacred to dreams and birds and—woodchucks, one of which sat straight up and looked solemnly at me out of his great brown eyes.

I sat on the low-growing limb of a tree, and was rocked by the wind outside. I forgot my object. What did it matter that I should find my bluejay? Was it worth while to go on? Was anything worth while, indeed, except to dream and muse, lulled by the music of the "laughing water"? Ah! if one were a poet!

Then the birds came. A cat-bird first, with witching low song, eying me closely with that calm, dark eye of his, the while he poured it out from a shrub,

a vireo, repeating over and over his few notes in tireless warble; high up in the maple across the chasm, a sweet-voiced goldfinch singing his soul away outside; and lastly, a robin, who broke the charm by a peremptory demand to know my business in his private quarters. I rose to leave him in possession. In rising I disturbed another resident, a red squirrel, who ran out on a branch and delivered as vehement a piece of mind as I ever heard, stamping his little feet and jerking his bushy tail with every word, scolding all over, to the tip of his longest hair.

I left them in their green paradise. I went to my room. I sat down in my rocker to consider.

Then the winds got up. Through the "bellows pipe," as they suggestively call the head of the valley, there poured such a gale that the birds could hardly hold on to their perches. All day long it tossed the branches, tore off leaves, beat the birds, rattled the windows, and filled the blue cover to our green bowl of a valley with clouds, even half way down the sides of the mountains themselves. And at last they began to weep, and I spent my twilight by an open window, wrapped in a shawl, listening to the

and looking out upon the hills, where I still hoped to find my bluejay.

VII.

The road that wound down through the valley, skirting its hills, bridging its brooks, and connecting the lonely homestead with the rest of the human world, had on one side a beautiful border of all sorts of greeneries, just as Nature, with her inimitable touch, had placed them. It was a home and a cover for small birds; it was a shade on a warm day; it was a delight to the eye at all times. Yet in the farmer's eye it was "shiftless" (the New Englander's bogy). The other side of the road he had "improved;" it gloried in what looked at a little distance like a single-file procession of glaring new posts, which on approaching were found to be the supports of one of man's neighborly devices—barbed wire. Rejoicing in this work of his hands on the left, he longed to turn his murderous weapons against the right side. He was labored with; he bided his time; but I knew in my heart that whoever went there next summer would find that picturesque road bristling with barbed wire on both sides. It will be as ugly as man can make it, but it will be "tidy" (New England's shibboleth), for no sweet green thing will grow up beside it. Nature doesn't take kindly to barbed wire.

The old stone wall at that time was an irresistible invitation to the riotous luxuriance of vines. Elder-bushes, with their fine cream-colored blossoms, hung lovingly over it; blackberry bushes, lovely from their snowy flowering to their rich autumn foliage, flourished beside it; and a thousand and one exquisite, and to me nameless, green things hung upon it, and leaned against it, and nearly covered it up. And what a garden of delight nestled in each protected corner of an old-fashioned zigzag fence! Yet all these are under the ban—"shiftless."

Thanks be to the gods who sowed this country so full of stones and trees, that the army of farmers who have worried the land haven't succeeded in turning it into the abomination of desolation they admire!

And now, having relieved my mind, I'll go on with the bluejay hunt.

The next morning it was, for a rarity, fine. I started up the wood road ahead of my guide, so that I might take my climb as easily as such a thing can be taken. Passing through the bare pasture, I entered the outlying clumps of spruce which form the advance-guard of the forests on Greylock, and here my leader overtook me, urging his fiery steeds, with their empty sled. Now horned beasts have had a certain terror for me ever since an exciting experience with them in my childhood. I stood respectfully on one side, prepared to fly should the "critters" (local) show malicious intent. On they came, looking at me sharply with wicked eyes. I made ready for a rush, when, lo! they turned from me, and dashed madly into a spruce-tree, nearly upsetting themselves, and threatening to run away. We were all afraid of each other.

The mortified driver apologized for their behavior on the ground that "they ain't much used to seeing a lady up in the wood lot." I generously forgave them, and then meekly followed in their footsteps, up, up, up toward the clouds, till we reached the bluejay neighborhood. Here we parted. My escort passed on still higher, and I seated myself to see at last my bluejays.

Dead silence around me. Not a leaf stirred; not a bird peeped. I began to make a noise myself—calls and imitations (feeble) of bird-notes to arouse their curiosity; a bluejay is a born investigator. No sign of heaven's color appeared except in the patches of sky between the leaves.

Other wood dwellers came; a rose-breasted grosbeak, with lovely rosy shield, with much posturing and many sharp "clicks," essayed to find out what manner of irreverent intruder this might be. Later his modest gray-clad spouse joined him. They circled around to view the wonder on all sides. They exchanged dubious-sounding opinions. They were as little "used to seeing a lady" as the oxen. They slipped away, and in a moment I heard his rich song from afar.

No one else paid the slightest attention to my coaxing, and I returned by easy stages to the spruces, where I had the misfortune to arouse the suspicion of a robin. Do you know what it is to be under robin surveillance? Let but one redbreast take it into his obstinate little head that you are a suspicious character, and he mounts the nearest tree—the very top twig, in plain sight—and begins his loud "Peep! peep! tut, tut, tut! Peep! peep! tut, tut, tut!"

This is his tocsin of war, and soon his allies appear, and then

No matter what you do or what you don't do. One will perch on each side of you, and join the maddening chorus, driving every bird in the neighborhood either to join in the hue and cry (as do some of the sparrows), or to hide himself from the monster that has been discovered.

I tried to tire them out by sitting absolutely motionless; but three, who evidently had business in the vicinity, for each held a mouthful of worms, guarded me to right and left and in front, and never ceased their offensive remarks long enough to stuff those worms into the mouths waiting for them.

I was not able to convince them that I had no designs on robin households, and I had to own myself defeated again. Then and there I abandoned the search for the bluejay.

VIII.

As I passed slowly up, looking well to my steps, and listening for birds, I heard a note that aroused me at once,—the squawk of a bluejay. It came from the higher ground, and I looked about for a pathway up the steep bank on my right. At the most promising point I could select I started my climb. Unfortunately that very spot had been already chosen by a small rill, a mere trickle of water, to come down. It was not big enough to make itself a channel and keep to it, but it sprawled all over the land. Now it lingered in the cows' footprints and made a little round pool of each; then it loitered on a level bit of ground, and soaked it full; when it reached a comfortable bed between the roots of trees, it almost decided to stay and be a pond, and it dallied so long before it found a tiny opening and straggled out, that if it did not result in a pond, it did accomplish a treacherous quagmire. In fact that undecided, feeble-minded streamlet totally "demoralized" the whole hillside, and with its vagaries I had to contend at every step of my way.

I reached the top, but I left deep footprints to be turned into pools of a new pattern, and as trophy I carried away some of the soil on my dress. Of my shoes I will not speak; shall we not have souls above shoe-leather?

As soon as I recovered breath after my hasty scramble to dry ground, I started toward a thick-growing belt of spruce trees which came down from the mountain and ended in a point,—one tree in advance, like the leader of an army. Here I found the bird I was seeking, a much disturbed bluejay, who met me at the door—so to speak—with a defiant squawk, a warning to come no nearer.

"Ah ha!" said I, exultingly, "are your little folk in there? Then I shall see them."

I slowly advanced; she disputed my passage at every step, but nothing was to be seen till her anxiety got the better of her discretion and she herself gave me the precious secret; she suddenly slipped through the trees to the other side, and became perfectly silent.

I could not follow her path through the tangle of trees, but I could go around, and I did. On a dead spruce wedged in among the living ones I saw the object of her solicitude; a lovely sight it was! Two young bluejays huddled close together on a twig. They were "humped up," with heads drawn down into their shoulders, and breast feathers fluffed out like snowy-white floss silk, completely covering their feet and the perch. No wonder that poor little mother was anxious, for a more beautiful pair I never saw, and to see them was to long to take them in one's hands.

Silent and patient little fellows they appeared, looking at me with innocent eyes, but showing no fear. They were a good deal more concerned about something to eat, and when their mother came they reminded her by a low peep that they were still there. She gave them nothing; she was too anxious to get them out of my sight, and she disappeared behind a thick branch.

In a moment I heard the cry of a bird I could not see. So also did the twins on the tree, and to them it meant somebody being fed; they lifted their little wings, spread out like fans their short beautiful tails, and by help of both, half hopped, half flew through the branches to the other side.

I followed, by the roundabout way again, and then I saw another one. Three bonny bairns in blue were on that dead spruce tree; two close together as before, and the third—who seemed more lively—sitting alone. He lifted his crest a little, turned his head and looked squarely at me, but seeing nothing to alarm him—wise little jay!—did not move. Then again mamma came forward, and remonstrated and protested, but only by her one argument, a squawk.

I quietly sat down and tried to make myself as much a part of the bank as possible, for I wanted the distracted dame in blue to go on with her household duties, and feed those babies. After a while she did calm down a little, though she kept one distrustful eye on me, and now and then came near and delivered a squawk at me, as if to assure me that she saw through my manœuvres, and despised them.

But I cared not at that moment for her opinion of me; she did not move my sympathies as do many birds, for she appeared insulted and angry, not in the least afraid. I wanted to see her feed, and at last I did—almost; she was to the last too sharp for me.

She came with a mouthful of food. Each one of the three rose on his sturdy little legs, fluttered his wings, opened his beak and cried. It was a sort of whispered squawk, which shows that the bluejay is a wary bird even in the cradle. When they were all roused and eager, the mother used that morsel as a bait to coax them through the tree again. She did not give it to either of her petitioners, but she moved slowly from branch to branch, holding it before them, and as one bird they followed, led by their appetite, like bigger folk,—

and as I had no desire to see them die of starvation, and leave the world so much poorer in beauty, I came away and left them to their repast.

That was not the end of the bluejay episode. A few days later a young bird, perhaps one of this very trio, set out by himself in search of adventures. Into the wide-open door of the barn he flew, probably to see for what the swallows were flying out and in. Alas for that curious young bird! He was noticed by the farmer's boy, chased into a corner, still out of breath from his first flight, then caught, thrust into an old canary cage, brought to the house, and given to the bird-student.

Poor little creature! he was dumb with fright, though he was not motionless. He beat himself against the wires and thrust his beak through the openings, in vain efforts to escape. We looked at him with great interest, but we had not the heart to keep him very long. In a few minutes he was taken out of the cage in a hand (which he tried to bite), carried to the door and set free.

Away like a flash went the little boy blue and alighted in a tree beside the house. For a few moments he panted for breath, and then he opened his mouth to tell the news to whom it might concern. In rapid succession he uttered half a dozen jay-baby squawks, rested a moment, then repeated them, hopping about the tree in great excitement.

In less than thirty seconds his cries were answered. A bluejay appeared on the barn; another was seen in a spruce close by; three came to a tall tree across the road; and from near and far we heard the calls of friends trooping to the rescue.

Meanwhile the birds of the neighborhood, where the squawk of a jay was seldom heard, began to take an interest in this unusual gathering. Two cedar birds, with the policy of peace which their Quaker garb suggests, betook themselves to a safe distance, a cat-bird went to the tree to interview the clamorous stranger, a vireo made its appearance on the branches, and followed the big baby in blue from perch to perch, looking at him with great curiosity, while a veery uttered his plaintive cry from the fence below.

All this attention was too much for a bluejay, who always wants plenty of elbow room in this wide world. He flew off towards the woods, where, after a proper interval to see that no more babies were in trouble, he was followed by his grown-up relatives from every quarter. But I think they had a convention to talk it over, up in the woods, for squawks and cries of many kinds came from that direction for a long time.

IN THE BLACK RIVER COUNTRY.

IX.

"I'm going to seek my singer," was the message I flung back next morning, as, opera-glass in hand, I started down the orchard towards the woods. I followed the path under the apple-trees, passed the daisy field, white from fence to fence with beauty,—despair of the farmer, but delight of the cottagers,—hurried across the pasture beyond, skirting the little knoll on which the cow happened this morning to be feeding, crossed the brook on a plank, and reached my daily walk.

This was a broad path that ran for half a mile on the edge of the lake. Behind it, penetrated every now and then by a foot-path, was the bit of old woods that the clearers of this land had the grace to leave, to charm the eye and refresh the soul (though probably not for that reason). Before it stretched the clear, sparkling waters of Lake George, and on the other side rose abruptly one of the beautiful mountains that fringe that exquisite piece of water.

Usually I passed half the morning here, seated on one of the rocks that cropped out everywhere, filling my memory with pictures to take home with me. But to-day I could not stay. I entered one of the paths, passed into the grand, silent woods, found a comfortable seat on a bed of pine needles, with the trunk of a tall maple tree for a back, and prepared to wait. I would test Thoreau's assertion that if one will sit long enough in some attractive spot in the woods, sooner or later every inhabitant of it will pass before him. I had confidence in Thoreau's woodcraft, for has not Emerson said:—