A WIDOW AND TWINS. 125 
feet. Suddenly, without making use of the 
rim of the nest, as I should have expected 
him to do, he was in the air, hovering in the 
prettiest fashion, and in a moment more had 
alighted on a leafless twig slightly above the 
level of the nest, and perhaps a yard from 
it. Within a minute the mother appeared, 
buzzing and calling, with answering calls 
from the youthful adventurer. At once — 
after a hasty reconnaissance of the man on 
the wall—she perched beside him, and 
plunged her bill into his throat. Then she 
went to the nest, served the other one in the 
same way, and made off. She had no time 
to waste at this juncture of affairs. 
When she had gone, I stepped up to the 
trunk of the tree to watch the little fellow 
more closely. He held his perch, and oc- 
cupied himself with dressing his plumage, 
though, as the breeze freshened, he was 
compelled once in a while to keep his wings 
in motion to prevent the wind from carrying 
him away. When the old bird returned, — 
in just half an hour, —she resented my in- 
trusion (what an oppressor of the widow and 
the fatherless she must by this time have 
thought me!) inthe most unmistakable man- 
