ery direction. They
did not seem to know what had struck them, and, as the wanton breezes
tossed them this way and that, they expressed their astonishment in
loud and frightened chirping. All over and no harm done, the bird
lover burst into a peal of laughter at the discomfiture of his
feathered neighbors, who looked at him as if they did not know what to
make of his untimely hilarity.

Then, too, one cannot be an observing rambler without stumbling upon
some exceedingly odd avian pranks, as the following description will
indicate: One day I was sitting on the steep bank of a wooded ravine
watching several rare little birds, hoping to discover some of their
nests. Presently the susurrus of the hummingbird was heard, and a
moment later two ruby-throats, a male and a female, flashed into view
on the slope below me. The tiny madam settled on a twig near the
ground, while her ruby-throated spouse performed one of the queerest
antics I have ever witnessed in featherland. He began to swing back
and forth in an arc of almost half a circle, the diameter of which was
at least twelve feet, just grazing his mate whenever he reached the
lowest point of his concentric movements. Back and forth he swung at
least a dozen times, looking like a tiny pendulum moving in an immense
arc, and, oddly enough, the segment seemed to be perfectly formed every
time. Had the bird wheeled entirely around, he would, I feel sure,
have described a circle and not an ellipse. The movement was
exceedingly swift, and might well have been called the embodiment of
grace. Suddenly, as the diminutive acrobat reached the highest point
of his arc, he dashed off to the right in a straight line, followed by
his mate, and in a moment both had disappeared. Whether other
observers have been witnesses of this curious gambol, I am unable to
say.

Have you ever been ill-mannered enough to watch the birds going to bed?
I remember spending an evening in the woods playing the role of Paul
Pry on my feathered neighbors. The sun was just sinking behind the
bluffs on the other side of a broad river--the Missouri--and the moon,
which was half full, was hanging high in the blue sky. What were those
two large black objects over yonder in the woods? My glass soon
revealed their identity--a pair of turkey buzzards perched side by side
on a limb, one of them squatted flat on his belly ready to take his
first nap. My curiosity led me to go near them, when they spread