124 ''UPON THE TREE-TOPy 



think it was a last year's oriole, not yet come 

 to his full plumage. Possibly he was attracted 

 by the cry of the young, as we know birds 

 sometimes are, and it seems not unlikely that 

 he replied to them in their own tones. How- 

 ever that may be, I saw later the young birds 

 ■ — two of them — and found to my surprise that 

 they were orioles and from our nest, for I saw 

 the well-marked mother feed them. Moreover, 

 orioles are not so clannish as robins, nor so often 

 found near each other. I knew of another pair 

 a quarter of a mile off, and once a strange fe- 

 male came upon a tree where our little mother 

 was looking for food. She received the visitor 

 — I regret to say — with a sharp " f uff ! " more 

 like a cat than a bird, on which the intruder 

 very properly left. 



The baby orioles were dumpy little yellowish 

 things, much like a young chicken in color, and 

 the most persistent cry-babies I ever saw among 

 birds. The young robin generally sits on his 

 branch motionless, seldom opens his mouth for 

 a call, and makes demonstrations only when 

 food is in sight ; the baby thrush is patience 

 and silence itself, — indeed how otherwise could 

 be a thrush ? Even the little blackbird, though 

 restless and fussy, does not cry much ; but those 

 oriole infants simply bawled (there 's no other 

 word) every instant. The cry was very pe- 



