The Spring of the Year

d them, you at least have changed them greatly. But they are mine still. Be friendly now, go s

d families that I know of, living in them this spring. A pair of crows and a pair of red-tailed hawks are nesting in the wood-lot; there are at least three families of chipmunks in as many of my stone-piles; a fine old tree-toad sleeps on the porch under the climbing rose; a horn

t an outcast or a scavenger to dwell in the pen, but a bird of character, however much he may lack in song or color. Ph?be does not make up well in a picture; neither does he perform w

t what you do, but how you do it!"-with a launch into the air, a whirl, an unerring snap at a cabbage butterfly, and an easy drop to the post again,

pig," but I cannot feel familiar with a bird of his air and carriage, who faces the world

afraid of nothing, not even the cold; and he migrates only because he is a flycatcher, and is thus compelled to. The earliest spring day, however, that you fi

e miserable March days is a mystery. He came directly to the pen as he had come the year bef

e first to arrive this spring, he was the first to build and bring off a brood-or, perhap

en, calling the day long, and, toward the end of the second week, occasionally soaring into th

r nearly three weeks, his house-lot chosen, his mind at rest, his heart beating faster with every sunrise. It was as plain as day that he knew-was c

tell me all about it? Had she just come along and fallen instantly in love with him and his fine pig-pen? It is pretty evident that he nested here last year. W

story. But who wi

f an old, last year's nest still showed on a stringer, and I wondered if they had decided on this or some other site for

es, I made a little bracket and tacked it up on one of the stringers. It ap

ished, was as safe as a castle. And how perfect a thing it was! Few nests, indee

st linings when there came a long, hard rain that beat through the crack and soaked the little cradle. This was serious, for a gre

bottom up thicker, carried the walls over on a slant that brought the outermost point within the line of the crack

othing could be softer and lovelier than the inside, the cradle, and nothing drie

a newly plastered house. It felt wet to my touch. Yet I noticed that the birds were already brooding. Every night and of

ood. Instead of wet and cold, the nest to-day was warm to my hand, and dry almost to the bottom. It had changed color, too, all the upper part having turned a soft silver-gray. She (I am sure it was she) had not b

less, and shapely. While the little ph?be hen was ha

an, like Mrs. Olive Thorne Miller, could find them in him. Not much can be said of this flycatcher family, except that it is useful-a kind of virtue that gets its chief reward in heaven. I am acq

ing. A flycatcher knows nothing of his shortcomings. He believes he can sing, and in time he will prove it. If desire and effort count for anything, he certainly must prove it in time. How long the family has already been training, no one knows. Everybody knows, however, the success each flycatcher of them has th

on. He hunted in the neighborhood and occasionally called to his mat

AND HE

peaking the extreme length of his day, the monotony of the drip, drip, drip from the eaves, and the sitting, the ceaseless sitting, of his b

ey began to rise, pushing the mother up so that she was forced to stand over them; then pushing her out until she could cling only to the side of the nest at night; then

t, wide world of green and blue and of golden light! I saw o

so that in leaving the nest the young would have to d

low. But Nature, in this case, was careful of her pearls. Day after day they clung to the nest, even after they might have flow

ir mother, who, darting to them, calling loudly, and, whirling

ny family. Seven days after the first brood were awing, I found the new eggs in the nest. Soon after that the male bir

ssible that he may have remained as leader and protector to the first brood; or (perish the thought!) might he have grown weary at sight of

ss, even ignominious death by

brought within a few days of flight; then, one day, I saw a little wing hanging listlessly over the side of the nest. I went closer. One had died. It had starved to death. Ther

al use to the world? How does she compare in value with the pig? Weeks later I saw several of

igns to dwell under roof of mine commands my friendship. But no other bird takes Ph?be's place in m

nsive! this bird with the cabbage butterfly in his beak! The faint and damning praise! And humble? There is not a humble fe

ociation; and the lowly work of feeding the creature has be