I9031 



Perry — A Robin Story. 



123 



cat appeared to be puzzled, on the one hand, by the whiding of 

 the captive bird, and somewhat intimidated, on the other hand, 

 by the fruntic appeals and plucky showing of the male robin. 



All this I saw in the twinkling of an eye 



Jumping over the fence, I took hold of the captive bird with 

 my right hand and of the rather cumbersome branch with the left, 

 and tried to cut the twine with my teeth, as I had no knife with me 

 at the time ; bul in this I was unsuccessful. So, retracing my 

 steps over the fence with bird, branch and all, I reached my shed, 

 where I knew there was a pair of scissors, with which, on second 

 thought, 1 severed, not the twine, but the mere shred of skin that 

 sMll held together the dislocated leg of the bird, and so released 

 the latter. 



After a few gentle strokes of the hand upon its back, I let the 

 now crippled robin take its flight. It alighted first on the ground 

 in the garden, and remained there for a few minutes, regaining it's 

 wind and strength. Then it perched itself on one of the plum- 

 trees 



After relating the above tncts to my people at the breakfast 

 table, my sister and I repaired to the garden, where to our utter 

 amazement and delight we beheld the crippled robin bathing it's 

 stump in a pail (which I had previously filled with vjaX&r) by sitting- 

 on the brim of the pail and lowering itself so as to reach the refresh- 

 ing liquid. And that it did repeatedly in our presence, when we 

 were but a few feet away from it 



Finally my sister wanted to capture the poor thing, so as to 

 nurse it's amputated limb, and she made a move in that direction, 

 but the wounded robin flew away with it's male companion who 

 had been around all the time, giving vent to it's fear by repeated 

 notes of anguish, and it was not seen any more. 



