ird, uncle, and pull it to pieces, and see how it is
done."

"To be sure, Nat," he cried; "to be sure, my boy. That's the way; but
stop a moment; how would you put it together again?"

"Oh! I think I could, uncle," I said; "I'm nearly sure I could. How
could I get one to try with?"

"Why, we might buy one somewhere," he said thoughtfully; "for I don't
think they'd lend us one at the British Museum; but I tell you what,
Nat," he cried: "I've got it."

"Have you, uncle?"

"To be sure, my boy. There's your aunt's old parrot that died and was
stuffed. Don't you know?"

I shook my head.

"It was put somewhere up-stairs in the lumber-room, and your aunt has
forgotten all about it. You might try with that."

"And I'd stuff it again when I had found out all about it, uncle," I
said.

"To be sure, my boy," said uncle, thoughtfully; "I wonder whether your
aunt would want Buzzy and Nap stuffed if they were to die?"

"She'd be sure to; aunt is so fond of them," I said. "Why, uncle, I
might be able to do it myself."

"Think so?" he said thoughtfully. "Why, it would make her pleased, my
boy."

But neither Buzzy nor Nap showed the slightest intention of dying so as
to be stuffed, and I had to learn the art before I could attempt
anything of the kind.

CHAPTER FOUR.

THE REMAINS OF POOR POLLY.

The very first opportunity, my uncle took me up with him to the
lumber-room, an attic of which my aunt kept the key; and here, after
quite a hunt amongst old portmanteaux, broken chairs, dusty tables,
bird-cages, wrecked kennels, cornice-poles, black-looking pictures, and
dozens of other odds and ends, we came in a dark corner upon the remains
of one of my aunt's earliest pets. It was the stuffed figure of a grey
parrot that had once stood beneath a glass shade, but the shade was
broken, and poor Polly, who looked as if she had been moulting ever
since she had been fixed upon her present perch, had her head partly
torn from her shoulders.

"Here she is," said my uncle. "Poor old Polly! What a bird she was to
screech! She never liked me, Nat, but used to call me _wretch_, as
plain as you could say it yourself. It was very wicked of me, I dare
say, Nat, but I was so glad when she died, and your aunt was so sorry
that she cried off and on for a week."

"But she never was a pretty bird, uncle," I said, holding the stuffed
creature to the light.

"No, my boy, never, and she used to pull off her feathers when