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Updated: August 25, 2024
Right in the middle of the story of his travels from far-away Mexico he flew to the top of a little tree, began to sing, then flew out into the air with his legs dangling and his tail wagging up and down in the funniest way, and there continued his song as he slowly dropped down into the thicket again. It was a beautiful song and Peter hastened to tell him so. Chut-Chut was pleased.
"Oh, no! I don't think any one ought to be shut up for anything." "My dear Maggie!" said Paul in his fatherly protecting voice. "No prisons? Think what would become of us all." "Oh!" said Maggie impatiently, "I'm not practical of course, I don't know what one should do, but I do know that no one should be shut up." "Chut-chut " said Grace.
Maggie, Grace, and Paul were figures, guarded and defended, outwardly friendly. Grace behaved during those months very well, but Maggie knew that this was a fresh sign of hostility. The "Chut-Chut," "My dear child," and the rest that had been so irritating had been after all signs of intimacy. They were now withdrawn.
Below his breast he was all white. To have seen him you would have thought that he suspected Peter might do him some harm. He acted that way. If Peter hadn't known him so well he might have been offended. But Peter knew that there is no one among his feathered friends more cautious than Chut-Chut the Chat. He never takes anything for granted.
But Peter knew they were, and he also knew that he could never mistake Chut-Chut for any other member of the family because of his big size, which was that of some of the members of the Sparrow family. His back was a dark olive-green, but his throat and breast were a beautiful bright yellow. There was a broad white line above each eye and a little white line underneath.
"I wonder," said Peter, speaking out loud without thinking, "where he builds his nest. I wonder if he builds it on the ground, the way Creeper does." "No," declared Mummer, who all the time had been darting about close at hand. "He doesn't, but I do. Chut-Chut puts his nest near the ground, however, usually within two or three feet. He builds it in bushes or briars.
He showed it by giving a little concert all by himself. It seemed to Peter that he never had heard such a variety of whistles and calls and songs as came from that yellow throat. When it was over Chut-Chut abruptly said good-by and disappeared. Peter could hear his sharp "Chut! Chut!" farther along in the thicket as he hunted for worms among the bushes.
But they soon found out that this same "coal-tar" was very good to eat, and that I had brought a quantity of it. One day when I was spreading a sea-biscuit thick with it for a wide-awake youngster, I heard them whisper, "Chut-chut!" meaning that a shark had bitten my hand, which they observed was lame.
Peter was just about to say something polite and pleasant when from just back of him there sounded a loud, very emphatic, "Chut! Chut!" Peter whirled about to find another old friend. It was Chut-Chut the Yellow-breasted Chat, the largest of the Warbler family. He was so much bigger than Mummer that it was hard to believe that they were own cousins.
He appears to be always on the watch for danger, even to the extent of suspecting his very best friends. When he had decided in his own mind that there was no danger, Chut-Chut came out for a little gossip. But like all the rest of the Warblers he couldn't keep still.
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