338 Bird -Lore 



plate. Before noon I had used all of my dozen plates, and when I left the beach 

 the birds were quietly feeding. 



When I came back with plate-holders reloaded, they were still there, and 

 I took my position on the bar without disturbing them. The Red-backs always 

 kept close together, so all show in each of my pictures, except one. This time 

 they all came along the beach toward me, hesitating as they drew near, then 

 made a detour out into the water, filing past in front of me and so close that I 

 could hardly rack my lens out far enough to get them in sharp focus. 



The Yellow-legs kept mostly to the little lagoon close inside the bar where 

 it scampered zigzag after the minnows or pollywogs, or probed in the muddy 

 bottom, causing rings of ripples in the quiet water. 



As the shadows lengthened across the clear waters, I used my last plate, 

 but still I was loth to leave. I had spent more than seven hours with these 

 interesting birds, and made twenty-four shots, and, as development afterward 

 proved, had bagged fifteen beautiful pictures, and my game was still alive to 

 enliven the shores of other lakes and marshes, and let us hope that they reached 

 their winter homes in the far South without accident. 



A Tragedy 



By LOUISE FOUCAR MARSHALL. Tucson, Ariz. 



THE House Finch bride stood for a moment on the fig tree before taking 

 a drink from the bucket of water under the dripping faucet. Perhaps it 

 was a Hummingbird, poised before a rosebud, or a Wren slipping in and 

 out of the rose-vine, that persuaded her to fly over and investigate. A little 

 spot at an intersection of the trellis, hidden by rose-leaves, seemed an ideal 

 building-site. She started immediately to homestead it by bringing in a few 

 sticks which she arranged for the bottom of her nest, -unmindful of the fact 

 that the trellis was but eight inches from the porch window, and that her nest, 

 just at a convenient height, had no protecting leaves to shield it from full view 

 from within the porch. 



The next morning (March 28, 191 7) she came again, and with little twigs 

 built up half of the skeleton framework of her cuplike nest. She worked until 

 noon, alone and untiringly, her mate sitting on the fig tree singing his delight. 

 Then they disappeared until evening, when she came to see if all was well. 

 The next morning she was at work again. The place seemed more enchanting 

 than ever, for there were strings cut at various lengths hanging all about the 

 trellis, and wonderful buds of cotton- wool on the rose-thorns; even a few stray 

 horsehair and downy chicken feathers were miraculously convenient. She toiled 

 until noon finishing the framework, now using sticks, strings, and horsehair. 

 Before bedtime she came to see that nothing had been disturbed. 



The third day she worked from morning till night, strengthening the frame- 



