possible through the meadow, far from his two trees,
seated myself on the edge of the slope at some distance from him, and
remained quiet. But he was never reconciled. His first act, as I started
down the field, was to fly out to meet me, as if to drive me away. When
he reached me, he would hold himself ten or fifteen feet above my head,
perfectly motionless excepting a slight movement of the wings, looking
as if he meditated an attack; and indeed I did sometimes fear that he
would treat me as he did the crows. As I came nearer, his mate flew up
out of the bushes, and added her demonstrations to his. Their movements
in the air were beautiful. One would beat himself up quite high, and
then hover, or apparently rest at that altitude, as if too light to come
down, at last floating earthward, pausing now and then, as if he
absolutely could not return to our level.

[Sidenote: _WHAT DID IT ALL MEAN?_]

Occasionally my presence caused a domestic scene not easy to interpret.
Madam, no doubt fully aware of the prying ways of the human family,
sometimes hesitated to return to her little ones in the bushes. She flew
around uneasily, alighting here and there, anxious and worried, but
plainly afraid of exposing her precious secret. Then her "lord and
master" took her in hand, flying at her, and following wherever she fled
before him, till he almost overtook her, when she dropped into the
marsh, and with a low, satisfied chuckle he took a wide circle around
and returned to his tree. Scolding all the time, she remained some
minutes in the deep grass, then flew up high, and floated down to the
alder clump where the nest was placed. Upon this, her observant lord,
whose sharp eyes nothing escaped, instantly flew down again, dashed
impetuously through the alders, and without pausing returned to his
post. Now how should one interpret that little family interlude?

Later, when the young were out of the nest and quite expert on wing, the
redwing's relations with them puzzled me also. I often saw the two who
appeared to compose the family flying about with their mother, and I
knew they were his because he frequently joined the party. But their
conduct seemed unnatural, and a doubt stole over me whether this
bird--this individual, I mean--could be a domestic tyrant. I knew from
previous studies that the love-making manners of the redwing are a
little on the "knock-down-and-drag-out" order of some savage tribes of
our own species. To chase