624 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



original and amusing bird, without the slightest fear of any of us. 

 He was christened Mephistopheles. 



x\s he was learning to fly, it seemed advisable that he should 

 be taught to come at our call to be fed; and accordingly one day, 

 by way of experiment, I held out a piece of meat to him and 

 squeaked like a mouse. There was a rush of downy pinions, and 

 his talons were neatly arranged about my lips. He was evidently 

 a good deal excited, but was careful not to hurt me any more than 

 was absolutely necessary in order to secure the mouse which he 

 fancied he had cornered in my mouth. I was just reckless enough 

 to try it again on the following day as he perched on the low branch 



of an apple tree. 

 His power of de- 

 tecting the direc- 

 tion whence the 

 sound came proved 

 fully equal to the 

 occasion, and the 

 result was the 

 same as in the first 

 instance. The end 

 of Mephisto was 

 tragic in the ex- 

 treme. He was 

 sometimes fas- 

 tened by a linen 

 cord six or eight 

 feet long and as 

 large as a lead 

 pencil, which when not in use was hung across the perch where he 

 slept. Evidently he felt that the food furnished him was too ef- 

 feminate, for the powerful stomachs of all birds of prey require a 

 certain amount of such indigestible matter as hair, feathers, or bone 

 to keep them in good condition. So one ill-fated night, in looking 

 about for something that would answer that purpose, he unfor- 

 tunately hit upon the' cord as a substitute, and proceeded to swallow 

 one end of it. The first few feet must have fully satisfied his crav- 

 ings, but there was the rest to be disposed of, and the most feasible 

 method that presented itself naturally was to go on swallowing. 

 The thing must have grown extremely dry and distasteful as inch 

 after inch disappeared, still there was nothing for it but to go on, 

 which he did. In the morning he was strangely silent and gloomy, 

 with hardly a foot of cord protruding from his beak. Any attempt 

 on our part to remove the cord proved not only fruitless but painful, 



Northern Shrike. 



