THE COMMON WREN. 355 



pass, and his tiny, sparkling eye seems to take in every 

 object. 



Now he drops from the post, and flying low, with a steady 

 flutter of his short, round wings, he dives into a thicket of 

 rose bushes. Here he slides up and down the stems like an 

 automaton, peers under the leaves with every conceivable 

 twist of the neck, and runs on the ground, darting in and 

 out of rubbish with the quickness and penetration of a 

 mouse. 



The great variety and abundance of his insect food, 

 whether gleaned amidst the thick foliage, drawn from 

 chinks and crevices, or captured on the wing, is taken so 

 adroitly that only the close observer can comprehend the 

 important services of this restless and diminutive species 

 in subduing these pests of the house and garden. Alas, 

 that man, that lord of creation, should eat his currants, his 

 cabbage and his lettuce, all unconscious of how much the 

 birds have saved for him ! 



Presently I hear the Wren again, and in altogether another 

 part of the garden. This time he is not a singer but a 

 scold. How angry is his chirp, as he berates that white cat, 

 which, standing fair in front of his retreat in the blackberry 

 bushes, ogles him with her green fire-balls, and moves the 

 end of her tail in signal of the murder-prepense in her heart. 

 But this wee Wren is one of the bravest of birds, and is 

 always so well on the alert that Grimalkin soon gives up in 

 despair, and concludes to suffer alike the mortification of 

 the scolding and the disappointment of the stomach. 



Having been quite curious as to the nesting of this Wren, 

 which has come so regularly to these premises for years, I 

 go out into the yard and watch his movements. There, he 

 has taken a spider from that web in the apple-tree and has dis- 

 appeared under the horse-sheds back of the church. Conclud- 



