d to
stand by its own fitness, to be a part of the branch itself. Soft,
creamy-hued vegetable cotton, pressed and felted into a certain firmness
of consistency, formed the structure, and a close covering of lichens
held it in shape and completed its beauty, while giving an apple-branch
tone that made it almost invisible. An inch in depth and the same in
breadth furnished ample quarters for the twin hummingbird babies whose
home it was.

But the charm that had drawn me across four States to study it was its
situation. For when has one of those airy sprites, with the whole
expanse of the tallest trees at command, chosen to come down to the
level of mortals, to set up her domestic gods within reach of a human
hand, and within hearing of a human ear? What friendly spirit bade her
select a scantily leaved branch, backed by the heavy foliage of
luxuriant maples, that rendered her fairy-like home conspicuous whatever
the weather and wherever the sunlight fell? By what happy thought did
she settle upon a low bough with long swaying ends, by which to draw it
gently down, and thus let the enraptured bird-lover watch closely day by
day the growth and development of her darlings? and so near a house that
one could look into it from a window? Long railway trips in dusty
August, the hot days and hotter nights of that fiery month, and the
various minor discomforts of close summer--boarder quarters were all
forgotten in a great joy.

Nothing was ever more bewitching to watch than that atom in feathers,
the hummingbird mother. She was so tiny that her life might be crushed
out between a thumb and finger, yet she was full of love and anxiety
about her birdlings. She was thoughtful in her care of them, and
industrious in supplying their wants. In a word, she was a pattern of
perfect and beautiful motherhood. Charming it was, beyond expression, to
see her come home to her beloved, embroidering angles in the
air,--hummingbird fashion,--pausing a dozen times on wing, looking at
them from as many points of view, and at length dropping lightly as a
feather upon the edge, like a fairy godmother with her gifts of food;
and then in a few moments suddenly rise, up--up--up, with body erect as
if mounting an invisible ladder, till, at five or six feet above, she
shot away so swiftly no eye could follow her.

[Sidenote: _BEAUTIFUL MOTHERHOOD._]

When startled, as she frequently was in her close proximity to our noisy
race, she darted off like a