CORBIE 



end of the feather, which sticks out of the tip of the case, 

 does look very much hke the soft hairs at the end of a 

 paint-brush, the kind that has a hollow quill stem, you 

 know. After they were once started, dear me, how those 

 feathers grew! It seemed no time at all before they cov- 

 ered up the ear-holes in the side of his head, and no time 

 at all before a little bristle fringe grew down over the 

 nose-holes in his long horny beak. 



He was nearly twenty days old before he could stand 

 up on his toes like a grown-up crow. Before that, when 

 he stood up in his nest and ^^kahed" for food, he stood 

 on his whole foot way back to the heel, which looks like 

 a knee, only it bends the wrong way. When he was about 

 three weeks old, however, he began standing way up 

 on his toes, and stretching his leg till his heels came up 

 straight. Then he would flap his wings and exercise 

 them, too. 



Of course, you can guess what that meant. It meant 

 — yes, it meant that Corbie was getting ready to leave 

 his nest ; and before the Brown-eyed Boy and the Blue- 

 eyed Girl really knew what was happening, Corbie went 

 for his first ramble. He stepped out of his nest-box, 

 which had been placed on top of a flat, low shed, and 

 strolled up the steep roof of the woodshed, which was 

 within reach. There he stood on the ridge-pole, the little 

 tike, and yelled, " Caw,'' in almost a grown-up way, as if 



107 



