re.

"I'll go right home and get her and bring her here so she can see
this tobacco herself!" he said aloud. "Then she'll know where that
shred came from which fell on the floor." He did not say "which I
brushed onto the floor," for he never could remember long that he
ever did such careless things.

Well, Rusty Wren went out of the window a good deal faster than he
had flown in. And, in less time than it takes to tell it, he was
perched on top of his house again and calling to his wife.

"I know now where the tobacco came from!" he sang out. "Just come
outside and I'll show you. It's upstairs in the carriage house!"

To his delight, Mrs. Rusty answered in the sweetest tone
imaginable. But she said she didn't want to come out just then. And
she didn't seem a bit interested in tobacco any more.

"You come right into the house!" she cried. "There's something here
that I want to show you."

Rusty Wren whisked through the hole in the maple syrup can. Home
had never looked quite so good to him before, for he had not been
there since the middle of the morning.

"What is it?" he asked eagerly.

His wife was sitting on their nest. And there was nothing new in
the house, so far as he could see.

She moved aside then. "Look!" she said.

And, peering into the nest, Rusty saw a speckled egg there. It was
really a small egg. But to Rusty Wren's eyes it seemed decidedly
big.

He was so surprised that he couldn't speak for as much as two
seconds. And then he began to sing--he was so happy.

Though Mrs. Rusty kept very still, she seemed much pleased. And,
strange to say, she never mentioned _smoking_ to her husband again.

She had something more important to think about.

X

BAD NEWS

When Johnnie Green fastened the tin can to the tree in the dooryard
he couldn't have picked out a better spot for it. Of course, he
hoped that a pair of wrens would build their nest inside the syrup
can. But what he never dreamed was that the cherry tree was exactly
the sort of tree that wrens liked.

It was not that Rusty and his wife cared for cherries. But as soon
as Mrs. Wren had said how much she liked her new house, she
remarked that the old cherry tree was a fine place to hunt for bugs
and insects.

"Yes!" Rusty agreed. "And there's an ant hill near the foot of the
tree. It will be very convenient on stormy days, for we shall not
have to go far for our breakfast."

Not being fond of cherries, they did not look for