A Pair of Cousins — Robin and Thrush 205 



about some of the leaves. Then I loosened it and she 

 carried it away. Birds do not know how to use string, 

 for it is new to them. They sometimes get tangled and 

 hang themselves. 



Robins often show very great difference in the matter 

 of selecting a site for a nest. I saw one nest built on an 

 old rail fence a foot from the ground, another in the side 

 of an old stump, another under a porch, while the great 

 majority of robins will select a tree near a house and place 

 the nest in a strong crotch. The nest is generally built 

 with coarse sticks and strings on the outside and a good 

 cup of mud with an inner lining of finer grasses. Yet I 

 have sometimes found robin nests with hardly a bit of 

 mud. 



Each species of bird has a peculiar way of building 

 a nest that differs from that of every other species. 

 Among many of the common birds one can generally tell 

 what bird built the nest by a glance at the exterior and the 

 position in which it is placed. The vireos and the orioles 

 build a hanging nest, robins and jays and crows a bulky 

 nest, the warblers build a neat deeply-cupped structure, 

 the grosbeak has a thin framework that you can see 

 through, and the cuckoo and the dove make only a rough 

 platform for a home. 



Birds have a good deal of intelligence when it comes 

 to knowing their friends and enemies. One of our neigh- 

 bors had a robin nesting in the orchard, and it became 

 very fearless. Whenever the cat went near the nest the 

 robin darted at it and clipped it on the back of the head 

 and ears. And the animal would beat a hasty retreat, for 

 It had been taught not to catch birds. 



