BIRD STORIES 



tuck the feather comforter she carried on her breast so 

 cosil}^ about that precious egg, that it would need no 

 other padding to keep it warm. She would stay there, 

 the faithful mother, from about two o'clock each after- 

 noon until nine or ten o'clock the next morning. She 

 would not leave for one minute, to eat or get a drink of 

 water. Then, about nine or ten o'clock each morning, 

 Sire Dove would slip onto the nest just as she moved 

 off, and they would make the change so quickly that 

 the egg could not even get cool. That one very dear 

 egg would need two birds to take care of it, one always 

 snuggling it close while the other ate and flew about 

 and drank. 



So they would sit, turn and turn about, for fourteen 

 days. All this while they would be very gentle with each 

 other, saying softly, ''Coo-coo," something as tame 

 pigeons do, only in shorter notes, or calling, ''Kee-kee- 

 kee." And sometimes Sire Dove would put his beak to 

 that of his nesting mate and feed her, very likely, as 

 later they would feed their young. For when the two 

 weeks' brooding should be over, there would be a funny, 

 homely, sprawling, soft and wobbly baby dove within 

 the nest. 



The father and mother of him would still have much 

 to do, it seems ; for hatching a dove out of an egg is only 

 the easier half of the task. The wobbly baby must be 



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