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No, so far as color went, Mother Nomer might have chosen a spot in an open field, where there were little broken sticks or stones to give it a mottled look such a place, indeed, as her ancestors used to find for their nesting in the old days when there were no houses. Such a place, too, as most of this kind of bird still seek; for not all of them, by any means, are roof-dwellers in cities.
Dodo nearly stepped upon a couple of greenish, dark-spotted eggs, that were nearly as large as a Hen's. "Are the Gulls still nesting, Uncle Roy? And what are those dark streaky birds over there?" "These are left-over eggs that did not hatch, for nesting is over in July at latest, and the dark birds are young Gulls in their first plumage.
That's the way we play the game." We rambled on, and passed a pleasant old stone-built cottage in the wood, with a tiny garden. "It's a curious thing," said Father Payne, "but in the spring I always want to live in all the houses I see. It's the nesting instinct, no doubt. I think I could be very happy here, for instance much happier than in my absurd big house, with all you fellows about.
The Maryland yellow-throats were nesting in great numbers in the young growth of woods on the hill of the ravine, and ringing out their hammer-like note in the merriest manner; a note that no one understood until Dr.
Horse-hair is used in preference to other kinds of hair; if this be not available crows will use human hair, or hair plucked from off the backs of cattle. Those who put out skins to dry are warned that nesting crows are apt to damage them seriously. Three or four eggs are laid. These are dull green, speckled with brown. Crows affect great secrecy regarding their nests.
Yet the summer will come and the sweet smell of the flowering beans, and the song of the nesting birds, and the plentiful reward of the year crowned with fatness. It is a symbol of this marriage of mine. To-day we sow the seed; next, after a space of raving rains and winds, will follow the long, white winter of death, then some dim, sweet spring of awakening, and beyond it the fulness of all joy.
Then, there is another flock, a flock of girls, victims of the Chimera, walking with a nimble, a prancing step, with music scores under their arms, on the way to the maestro's; slender, light-haired English misses, who want to become prima donnas of comic opera; fair-skinned, buxom Russian parishnas who greet their acquaintances with the sweeping bow of a dramatic soprano; Spanish señoritas of bold faces and free manners, preparing for stage careers as Bizet's cigarette-girl frivolous, sonorous song-birds nesting hundreds of leagues away, and who have flown hither dazzled by the tinsel of glory.
As for songs, it is September, and the silence of July is long at an end. This year's robins are in full voice; and the only song that is not for love or nesting the childish song of boy-birds, the freshest and youngest note is, by a happy paradox, that of an autumnal voice.
And outside the home oh, there were the most wonderful things to see. The trailing arbutus trailed everywhere; the lady slippers grew even in the front dooryard. The old trees in the yard were soon filled with nesting birds; the apple and pear trees in bloom were a sight never to be forgotten.
Wallace Snaith gathered his forces and retreated from the field of battle. A man on a spent horse met him at his own gate as he dismounted. He handed the cattleman a note. On the sheet of dirty paper was written: The birds you want are nesting in a dugout on the river four miles below town. You got to hurry or they'll be flown. Snaith read the note, tore it in half, and tossed the pieces away.
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