A Family of North Dakota Marsh Hawks 433 



approximated, and which raised them above the damp ground. No wonder 

 the old birds were anxious about their helpless brood. 



Young and inexperienced as they were, — and they could hardly have been 

 over two weeks old, — their instincts were already stirring and, when my head 

 appeared above the green wall, they raised their dark brown eyes and opened 

 their hooked bills at me. At the base of their bills the naked skin was a bright 

 lemon-yellow, that gave a surprising touch of color to their dull, creamy buff 

 garb. Although their bodies were covered with down, wing-quills were 

 obviously developing inside blue pin-feather cases. The five nestlings showed 

 differences in size that indicated different dates of hatching. Two were deci- 

 dedly larger than the others, and one was so much the smallest of the clutch that 

 for convenience I dubbed it Little Brother. Altogether the downy brood made 

 a most attractive nestful, justifying the most solicitous care. 



In trying to make friends with the family, I had followed the example of a 

 previous visitor, and brought some mice that had been trapped about the farm. 

 When the parents discovered me and came flying over, crying out in alarm, I 

 talked to them in my most reassuring tones and presented my peace offering, 

 holding each mouse by the tail high overhead for them to inspect carefully 

 before dropping it in the nest. They swooped low, as if to investigate this sur- 

 prising phenomenon, and then the female went off and left me there. Feminine 

 intuition, I said to myself, as the male came screaming over my head. She 

 evidently felt that I was harmless! Or was it the mice? Perhaps she had a 

 prejudice in favor of philanthropic helpers of hard-working mothers. Subse- 

 quent events however, led me to abandon these flattering theories. She had 

 gone off, it is true — perhaps she had been interrupted when locating a mouse 

 of her own — but she had left her mate to guard the nest ! 



He certainly did the full duty of man. Had I been a murderous gunman, 

 he could have done no more. Indeed, for all he knew, I might at any moment 

 prove to be a gunman. Used to making friends with families of small birds, 

 which, from toleration of my presence, would quickly pass to indifference or 

 friendly acceptance of neighborly interest and commissary assistance, I failed 

 to realize what a threatening monster I must appear to these wild raptorial 

 birds and, innocent of heart, tried them all too sorely. To anxious Circus 

 parents, ignorant of modern methods in ornithology, I surely did most alarm- 

 ing things. For, after setting up my camp-stool, opening my camera, and 

 breaking off the weeds between it and the nest, I found it necessary to pose the 

 largest of the photographees. The little fellow was down in the bushes behind 

 the nest and, when I tried to get it up into the light, with an instinct bigger 

 than it was, whipped over on its back, threw up its yellow feet till it seemed 

 to be all claws, and caught at my finger so adeptly that I was content to poke it 

 back into focus with a stick. What right-minded father could look on calmly 

 when such unprecedented, portentous liberties were being taken with his 

 brood? 



