panion. The two
alight a few yards from the bone, and after some delay, during which
the vicinity is sharply scrutinized, one of the crows advances boldly to
within a few feet of the coveted prize. Here he pauses, and if no trick
is discovered, and the meat be indeed meat, he seizes it and makes off.

One midwinter I cleared away the snow under an apple-tree near the
house, and scattered some corn there. I had not seen a bluejay for
weeks, yet that very day they found my corn, and after that they came
daily and partook of it, holding the kernels under their feet upon the
limbs of the trees and pecking them vigorously.

Of course the woodpecker and his kind have sharp eyes. Still I was
surprised to see how quickly Downy found out some bones that were placed
in a convenient place under the shed to be pounded up for the hens. In
going out to the barn I often disturbed him making a meal off the bits
of meat that still adhered to them.

"Look intently enough at anything," said a poet to me one day, "and you
will see something that would otherwise escape you." I thought of the
remark as I sat on a stump in the opening of the woods one spring day. I
saw a small hawk approaching; he flew to a tall tulip-tree and alighted
on a large limb near the top. He eyed me and I eyed him. Then the bird
disclosed a trait that was new to me; he hopped along the limb to a
small cavity near the trunk, when he thrust in his head and pulled out
some small object and fell to eating it. After he had partaken of it
some minutes he put the remainder back in his larder and flew away. I
had seen something like feathers eddying slowly down as the hawk ate,
and on approaching the spot found the feathers of a sparrow here and
there clinging to the bushes beneath the tree. The hawk then--commonly
called the chicken hawk--is as provident as a mouse or squirrel, and
lays by a store against a time of need; but I should not have discovered
the fact had I not held my eye to him.

An observer of the birds is attracted by any unusual sound or commotion
among them. In May and June, when other birds are most vocal, the jay is
a silent bird; he goes sneaking about the orchards and the groves as
silent as a pickpocket; he is robbing birds'-nests and he is very
anxious that nothing should be said about it, but in the fall none so
quick and loud to cry "Thief, thief" as he. One December morning a troop
of them discovered a little screech-owl secreted in the hollow