110 PHILLIDA AND CORIDON. 



the devoted pair exult, when, in spite of owls 

 and hawks, squirrels and weasels, small boys 

 and full - grown oologists, they have finally 

 reared a brood of offspring ! The long uncer- 

 tainty and the thousand perils only intensify 

 the joy. In truth, so far as this world is con- 

 cerned, the highest bliss is never to be had 

 without antecedent sorrow ; and even of heaven 

 itself we may not scruple to say that, if there 

 are painters there, they probably feel obliged 

 to put some shadows into their pictures. 



But of course (and this is what we have been 

 coming to through this long introduction), — of 

 course our friends of the air are happiest in the 

 season of mating ; happiest, and therefore most 

 attractive to us who find our pleasure in study- 

 ing them. In spring, of all times of the year, 

 it seems a pity that everybody should not turn 

 ornithologist. For " all mankind love a lover ; " 

 and the world, in consequence, has given itself 

 up to novel - reading, not knowing, unfortu- 

 nately, how much better that role is taken by 

 the birds than by the common run of story- 

 book heroes. 



People whose notions of the subject are de- 

 rived from attending to the antics of our im- 

 ported sparrows have no idea how delicate and 

 beautiful a thing a real feathered courtship is. 

 To tell the truth, these foreigners have asso- 



