om, and flew on Miss Laura's head, and
pecked saucily at her face as she sat sewing and watching them. They
were not at all afraid of me nor of Billy, and it was quite a sight to
see them hopping up to Bella. She looked so large beside them.

One little bird became ill while Carl was away, and Miss Laura had to
give it a great deal of attention. She gave it plenty of hemp seed to
make it fat, and very often the yolk of a hard boiled egg, and kept a
nail in its drinking water, and gave it a few drops of alcohol in its
bath every morning to keep it from taking cold. The moment the bird
finished taking its bath, Miss Laura took the dish from the cage, for
the alcohol made the water poisonous. Then vermin came on it; and she
had to write to Carl to ask him what do. He told her to hang a muslin
bag full of sulphur over the swing, so that the bird would dust it down
on her feathers. That cured the little thing, and when Carl came home,
he found it quite well again. One day, just after he got back, Mrs.
Montague drove up to the house with canary cage carefully done up in a
shawl. She said that a bad-tempered housemaid, in cleaning the cage that
morning, had gotten angry with the bird and struck it, breaking its
leg. She was very much annoyed with the girl for her cruelty, and had
dismissed her, and now she wanted Carl to take her bird and nurse it, as
she knew nothing about canaries.

Carl had just come in from school. He threw down his books, took the
shawl from the cage and looked in. The poor little canary was sitting In
a corner. Its eyes were half shut, one leg hung loose, and it was making
faint chirps of distress.

Carl was very much interested in it. He got Mrs. Montague to help him,
and together they split matches, tore up strips of muslin, and bandaged
the broken leg. He put the little bird back in the cage, and it seemed
more comfortable. "I think he will do now," he said to Mrs. Montague,
"but hadn't you better leave him with me for a few days?"

She gladly agreed to this and went away, after telling him that the
bird's name was Dick.

The next morning at the breakfast table, I heard Carl telling his mother
that as soon as he woke up he sprang out of bed and went to see how
his canary was. During the night, poor, foolish Dick had picked off the
splints from his leg, and now it was as bad as ever. "I shall have to
perform a surgical operation." he said.

I did not know what he meant, so I watched him when, aft