s by the overhanging eaves
and from all eyes by the thick screen of leaves. Only by patiently
watching the suspicious bird, as she lingered near with food in her
beak, did I discover its whereabouts. That brood is safe, I thought,
beyond doubt. But it was not: the nest was pillaged one night, either by
an owl, or else by a rat that had climbed into the vine, seeking an
entrance to the house. The mother bird, after reflecting upon her ill
luck about a week, seemed to resolve to try a different system of
tactics, and to throw all appearances of concealment aside. She built a
nest a few yards from the house, beside the drive, upon a smooth piece
of greensward. There was not a weed or a shrub or anything whatever to
conceal it or mark its site. The structure was completed, and incubation
had begun, before I discovered what was going on. "Well, well," I said,
looking down upon the bird almost at my feet, "this is going to the
other extreme indeed; now the cats will have you." The desperate little
bird sat there day after day, looking like a brown leaf pressed down in
the short green grass. As the weather grew hot, her position became very
trying. It was no longer a question of keeping the eggs warm, but of
keeping them from roasting. The sun had no mercy on her, and she fairly
panted in the middle of the day. In such an emergency the male robin has
been known to perch above the sitting female and shade her with his
outstretched wings. But in this case there was no perch for the male
bird, had he been disposed to make a sunshade of himself. I thought to
lend a hand in this direction myself, and so stuck a leafy twig beside
the nest. This was probably an unwise interference: it guided disaster
to the spot; the nest was broken up, and the mother bird was probably
caught, as I never saw her afterward.

One day a tragedy was enacted a few yards from where I was sitting with
a book: two song sparrows were trying to defend their nest against a
black snake. The curious, interrogating note of a chicken who had
suddenly come upon the scene in his walk first caused me to look up from
my reading. There were the sparrows, with wings raised in a way
peculiarly expressive of horror and dismay, rushing about a low clump of
grass and bushes. Then, looking more closely, I saw the glistening form
of the black snake, and the quick movement of his head as he tried to
seize the birds. The sparrows darted about and through the grass and
weeds, try