A Pair of Cousins — Robin and Thrush 203 



as speechless as I. She didn't cry; they say birds can't 

 cry, but it was sadder for all that. It was dumb grief. 

 She stayed about all day, waiting for her mate. I buried 

 him by the fence where he fell, stricken by I know not 

 what. 



Birds sometimes meet with accidental death. I once 

 saw a swallow fly against a telephone wire with such force 

 that the bird was killed instantly. Later in the season, 

 after the thrushes were grown, I found the body of a 

 thrush hanging to the barb of a wire fence down below the 

 orchard. The wire ran straight across the top of a zigzag 

 fence, and the bird, in full flight, had just skimmed the 

 top of the rail to go full force into the wire before it was 

 seen. The barb had caught in the neck, and the force had 

 swung the bird's body over the wire from below, locking 

 it in a death-grip. 



Last summer when I went out through the orchard 

 to examine the trees and see how many bird homes I could 

 find, I found many of the same tenants back, but for 

 some reason not as many robin families as usual. I found 

 only seven robin nests, while these cherry trees generally 

 feed about a dozen broods as well as furnishing a stamp- 

 ing-ground for all the neighboring robins half a mile 

 around. 



Two years ago an old robin built in an apple tree two 

 rows over from the cherries. This year he planted his 

 nest in the main crotch of the best Royal Ann cherry tree. 

 The minute I swung up into the branches to get some 

 fruit I was pounced upon by two angry robins. In two 

 minutes they raised such a cry of " Thief! Thief! " that 

 all the birds in the orchard were scolding me. It looked 



