loves to carry
about, are beautiful? Not so; the birds lost their beauty
with their lives.--CELIA THAXTER.

I walked up my garden path as I was coming home from
shooting. My dog ran on before me; suddenly he went slower
and crept carefully forward as if he scented game. I looked
along the path and perceived a young sparrow, with its downy
head and yellow bill. It had fallen from a nest (the wind
was blowing hard through the young birch trees beside the
path) and was sprawling motionless, helpless, on the ground,
with its little wings outspread. My dog crept softly up to
it, when suddenly an old black-breasted sparrow threw
himself down from a neighboring tree and let himself fall
like a stone directly under the dog's nose, and, with
ruffled feathers, sprang with a terrified twitter several
times against his open, threatening mouth. He had flown down
to protect his young at the sacrifice of himself. His little
body trembled all over, his cry was hoarse, he was
frightened to death; but he sacrificed himself. My dog must
have seemed to him a gigantic monster, but for all that, he
could not stay on his high, safe branch. A power stronger
than himself drove him down. My dog stopped and drew back;
it seemed as if he, too, respected this power. I hastened to
call back the amazed dog, and reverently withdrew. Yes,
don't laugh; I felt a reverence for this little hero of a
bird, with his paternal love.

Love, thought I, is mightier than death and the fear of
death; love alone inspires and is the life of all.--IVAN
TOURGUENEFF.

The first sparrow of spring! The year beginning with younger
hope than ever! The faint, silvery warblings heard over the
partially bare and moist fields from the bluebird, the song
sparrow, and the redwing, as if the last flakes of winter
tinkled as they fell!--H. D. THOREAU.

I heard a robin in the distance, the first I had heard for
many a thousand years, methought, whose note I shall not
forget for many a thousand more,--the same sweet, powerful
song as of yore.--_Ibid._

Walden is melting apace. A great field of ice has cracked
off from the main body. I hear a song sparrow from the
bushes on the shore,--_olit, olit, olit--chip, chip, chip,
che char--che wis, wis, wis_. He, too, is helping to